


The Burh

by Nympha_Alba



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Angst, Character Death, F/M, Farmer Arthur, M/M, Magic rule
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-09
Updated: 2017-09-09
Packaged: 2018-12-25 11:01:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 38,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12034530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nympha_Alba/pseuds/Nympha_Alba
Summary: Under the harsh rule of magic in a post-apocalyptic world, Arthur grows up on a farm at the foot of a mysterious hill: The Burh. There are rumours of strange things happening at the top of the hill where once a tower stood, but Arthur doesn't believe them – until one day...





	1. Sword

**Author's Note:**

> All the love and thank yous in the world to: my pre-readers and betas [Matchboximpala](http://archiveofourown.org/users/matchboximpala), [Cookie](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Cookie), and [Merlinsdeheune (sindhunathi)](http://archiveofourown.org/users/sindhunathi), who cheered me on and helped me make this a much better story; my fantastic, ever-patient artist [Amphigoury](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Amphigoury), who stayed with me and this story for years (literally!); the ACBB mods for being awesome.

"Once upon a time," Leon begins, "a very long time ago, there was a great king. His mantle was fiery red with a golden dragon emblazoned on it, and the king's name was…" He looks down at the small boy on his lap and raises his eyebrows.

A grin crosses the boy's face. "Arthur!" 

Leon nods emphatically. "Spot on. His name was Arthur, just like yours."

This makes Arthur so excited he slides to the floor and capers about the room, flapping an invisible cloak. "Was he a good king?"

"He was a good and wise king," says Leon gravely. "But before he was a king, he was a prince, and I'm afraid the prince wasn't always wise. That was something he had to learn how to be. He had to learn how to fight, too, and he was just about your age when he began training with swords."

"I'm six," says Arthur, stopping. He wants to hear about swords. "Can I have a sword?"

"Well — we could make you one, perhaps. If we find a good piece of wood."

Arthur ponders this. "I'd like to have a sword."

"No promises, I'm afraid," says Leon. "I'll have to check with your dad first. He might not want you to... Anyway, Prince Arthur grew up and learned kindness and wisdom…"

"How did he do that?" Arthur understands how you can learn to fight with swords, but how do you learn to be wise?

Leon looks thoughtful. "A lot of difficult things happened to him, things he had to handle. And he met many good people who taught him to think everything through and reach good conclusions."

"What's a conk…?"

"It's when you look at something, a problem, very carefully. You look at every part of it, and you listen to everything that everyone has to say about it, and from all of that, you decide what _you_ think, and what all this adds up to. That's the conclusion."

Arthur doesn't quite understand, but nods. "Was there anyone named Leon?"

This seems to surprise Leon, but after a second he smiles. The smile looks a little sad, Arthur thinks. "As a matter of fact, yes — there was a knight named Leon. He was some years older than Arthur and worked for Arthur's father."

"Uther?"

Leon nods. "Yes, indeed. Uther was the king's name." 

"Did he live at Cavalon Farm?"

"He didn't. As befits a king, he lived in a castle — a beautiful castle named Camelot." 

"That sounds almost the same as Cavalon!"

"It does indeed." Leon turns and grins at Morgana, who is sitting at the other end of the bench with her knees drawn up under her chin and her hair covering her face like a curtain while she pretends not to be listening. "And, of course, there was the Lady Morgana, Prince Arthur's half-sister."

She looks up at that, tucks her hair behind her ear and gives Leon a smile.

"She was very beautiful," he says. After a pause, he adds in a low voice: "And brave. Yes, she was very brave." He straightens up and returns Morgana's smile. "And good with the sword, just like her brother."

Arthur sits down on the floor at Leon's feet, Morgana surreptitiously scoots closer on the bench, and they listen to Leon's stories about brave knights and sword-fighting ladies in armour until the lamps go out and the fridge stops humming. Ygraine puts aside the shirt she's been sewing new buttons onto and gets up from her chair to switch the fridge over to solar battery.

"Bedtime," she says to the children.

They know they have to go to bed when the magic mains switch off for the night, but they usually protest. Tonight, however, there's only a token grumble from Arthur, because he's so tired he can barely keep his eyes open. It's been a long day. He spent most of it in the fields with Dad and Leon and Morgana, learning how to sow — how to grab fistfuls of grain and throw them out in a semi-circle, spreading them evenly over the soil, because that's how you get a good crop. Then they had a dinner of watery soup with a slice of bread to dunk in it, and even a little of the last plum preserves for dessert. They don't often have dessert except in summer when there are berries, but now that they have a guest, there has to be dessert.

Leon always protests that he isn't a guest, he's a plain old wanderer and farm worker who is grateful for anything they can offer, but Ygraine insists on serving him the best they have — which usually isn't much, particularly at this time of the year when the pantry is nearly empty and the land has yet to yield anything but grass.

"We wouldn't know what to do without you, Leon," she says. "You come here so faithfully every spring and for every harvest, and we're truly grateful for your help. It makes a world of difference to us."

Not one to waste words, Uther only nods in agreement. 

Even though Leon works hard in the fields he always makes time to play with Arthur and Morgana and tell them stories. He tells them of the kings of old, of knights in armour and jousting tournaments. He tells them of the more recent time when people used the riches of the earth so carelessly that they wasted it all and made the weather change, until floods and wildfire killed millions of people and destroyed everything they'd built. Leon tells Arthur and Morgana about the world as it was before the Disasters, about huge cities with unimaginably tall buildings, of trains running underground and aeroplanes soaring like enormous metal birds in the sky — but that world is in ruins now, all gone. They can't quite picture it, but the thought still awes them.

This evening, after Leon's stories of swordfighting, Ygraine sits on the edge of Arthur's bed. She pulls the quilt up to his chin and smoothes it down over his body before she sings the song she sings to him every night:

_All the sheep are in now,_  
_All the horses,_  
_All the chickens,_  
_All the cows are in._

_All the pigs are in their pen,_  
_The geese are in their shed again._  
_Birds are safe within their nests,_  
_Humans, too, will get their rest._

_All the sheep are in now,_  
_All the cows are in._

Like he always does, Arthur asks: "But what about the goats? And the cats?"

They don't have either sheep, cows or pigs at their farm, but they do have goats and cats, and it seems unfair that they're not in the song at all. They, too, need a safe place to sleep.

Ygraine smiles and changes the last two lines: " _All the goats are in now, all the cats are in_."

Arthur gives a happy sigh at the completed ritual, and when his mother leans down to kiss him goodnight, he throws his arms around her neck.

She kisses him and straightens her back.

"You know the rules, Arthur," she says, skimming a hand over his hair. "We keep Leon's stories to ourselves. We don't go around telling them to anyone else. We don't talk about swords or knights or princes with anyone — only here, at home, within the family."

Arthur nods gravely. He knows this very well. "Only at home."

Ygraine goes to tuck Morgana in, and on the other side of the thin partition wall, Arthur hears her repeat the rules about Leon's stories.

When Ygraine has left, Morgana knocks softly on the wall. "Arthur?"

"Mmm?"

"I hope Leon gets us those swords."

"Me too," Arthur murmurs, and proceeds to dream of galloping horses and vast, sweeping skies.

***

It doesn’t occur to either Arthur or Morgana to wonder how Leon knows so much about past times and what the world was like before the floods and fires. Most people don't know much about that at all. In school, which Morgana has started but Arthur won't until the autumn, history lessons mostly stress the superiority of the world they live in today — a world swept clean of wasteful technology, a world where the balance has been restored and magic has taken its rightful place. A world where there's order and peace. Where everyone knows their place.

***

The day of her first history lesson, Morgana comes home bubbling with enthusiasm, enchanted by the glory of magic.

"Magic is _superior_!" she shouts, dancing around the room. "The rulers of the world have magic, and they are _superior_!"

Apparently that's the word of the day. Arthur doesn't know what it means, but he senses it can't be good — not for him.

Uther, who's just come in from the stables and is washing his hands at the sink, turns around and scowls at Morgana. She takes no notice.

" _I_ have magic!" she crows in triumph, skipping around Arthur. They have always known about her magic, but she hasn't realised its true significance until today. "I have magic, and magical people are the ruling class! That's what Miss Sefa told us today. I belong to the ruling class! And you don't," she adds to her brother, sticking her tongue out.

Uther's eyes turn hard. He takes a swift step towards Morgana and raises his hand, but when she shrinks away from him, he turns around sharply and stomps out.

There's a furrow between Ygraine's eyebrows as she stares at the slammed door, and then at her daughter.

"Morgana," she says sternly. "You just proved you're no better than anyone. You've offended your whole family and hurt your father — is that any way to behave? Bad behaviour is bad behaviour whether you have magic or not."

Morgana's eyes flash. " _You_ don't have magic either. And magic is the only thing that counts!"

Arthur's eyes widen. They don't often defy their parents, and never in this way.

Ygraine watches her daughter coolly. "That's quite enough, Morgana. We all deserve to be treated with respect, regardless of who we are, and you know that very well. What do you think Freya would say if she heard you now?"

Freya is their neighbour to the north, on the other side of The Burh, and the only farmer with magic they have ever heard of. Morgana worships her.

"I'm sorry," Morgana says at long last.

"Thank you." Ygraine turns away from her. "Would you set the table, please, Arthur? We'll eat as soon as your father is back."

Later that night, long after the magic mains have switched off, Morgana knocks on the partition wall.

"Arthur?" Her voice is a tiny whisper. "Are you asleep?"

Almost but not quite. "No."

Morgana comes tiptoeing in and sits cautiously on the edge of her brother's bed. "Arthur…" There's a pause in which she swings her legs, rocking the bed. "I'm sorry about what I said to you before." Another pause. "You know. About magic."

Arthur tries to fight off his sleepiness. This is important, he senses that. Morgana doesn't often apologise or admit that she's wrong. "Okay."

It's so dark he can't see her face, but he feels a small bounce.

"Friends?" she asks.

He sits up and hugs her. "Friends."

She hugs him close and he inhales the scent of soap and the lavender water Ygraine uses to rinse Morgana's long, black hair. 

"Friends forever," Morgana whispers. "We'll always look out for each other. Promise."

Arthur nods.

They have made each other this promise many times, but it's still comforting to hear her say it tonight of all nights. It doesn't matter who has magic and who hasn't. Morgana is his sister and they'll protect each other, always.

***

Yule is the best time of the year, Arthur thinks as he looks up and down the table. There's plenty to eat, even if he heard his parents whisper in worried tones about the weeks to come, and there are gifts for the children.

Arthur grins to himself. He loves having lots of people around, especially with everyone happy like now, talking and laughing. With his father on one side and Leon on the other, he feels grown up and important, and the fact that Leon is here is like a Yule gift in itself. Their neighbours have come as well — the DuLac family from Joyous Gard, the farm to their west, and Freya from Lake Farm to the north. Gaius, the herb doctor from town and a friend of the family, has just arrived.

Everyone has brought food. Arthur has never seen a table this laden in his life. There's winter kale, red winter apples, and dried, cured meat from the DuLacs. Freya, who runs a hydroponics farm and has access to the shops that only cater to magic users, has brought fresh fish, bakery bread, oranges and chocolate. Last Yule, Arthur tasted chocolate for the first time in his life and has lived on the memory since. His eyes keep going to the cupboard where he knows the chocolate is stashed. Gaius lives in the village and only has his tiny kitchen garden and a couple of beehives to sustain him, apart from whatever meager fees his clients can afford to pay, but he's brought what he could muster up - salt, dried herbs for infusions, and a jar of honey. The Pendragons supply fresh poultry, goat's cheese, root vegetables and fruit preserves. It's a feast indeed.

When Gaius produces a bottle of white liquor and places it on the table with a flourish, there's cheering all around. Arthur sniffs the liquid in his father's glass and pulls back sharply, coughing and grimacing. How can the grown-ups enjoy something so foul? But it seems to make them happy. It turns their faces warm and red and makes them laugh and sing. 

"There can be too much of a good thing, of course," Leon says to Arthur underneath the noise. "A little liquor is good for the soul. Too much makes people say and do stupid things."

"What kind of things?"

"They argue. They're unkind to each other and say things they don't mean and get upset about nothing, which gets them into bad fights sometimes. This bottle that Gaius brought, that we're all sharing — that's perfect. There's only just enough to make us merry. But it's not for children."

"Can I have some when I'm twelve? Twelve is big."

Leon smiles down at him. "Twelve is big, but liquor isn't good for you while you're still growing. Eighteen would be nearer the mark."

Eighteen! That's an eternity away.

"I'd rather have chocolate," says Arthur firmly, and Leon laughs.

"You're a wise man, Arthur. Chocolate is definitely good for the soul."

When they've eaten, it's time for the gifts. Last year, Arthur's best gift was a stuffed toy — a cat that his mother had made him from soft, blue fabric, with eyes, nose and whiskers embroidered on. This year, the gift with the most interesting shape is from Leon.

Arthur unwraps it eagerly and finds something so wonderful it takes his breath away: a _sword_ , a beautiful sword made of wood, with a flat, well-sanded and polished blade and a carved grip. Morgana and Lance DuLac have got swords, too, and they all hold them up to the light to admire them. Leon teaches them how to hold the swords correctly so the blade is well balanced in their hands, and promises he'll teach them how to attack and defend.

"I'll be here for three more days," he says, "and you're quick learners. You'll get good in no time at all."

Arthur falls asleep that night with Blue Cat on his left side and the sword on his right.


	2. Plough

"Stop!" Uther calls.

"Whoa," says Arthur to Amelia. The horse halts obediently so he can lift the heavy plough and liberate it from a squiggly piece of metal wire.

"Eyes on the ground," Uther says. "Always stop when the plough hits something or gets caught on something. That way you won't miss anything we can use, and you'll avoid damage to the plough."

Arthur nods. Uther has repeated this time after time but it's so hard to keep his eyes on the ground, so dull to look at brown earth when there are birds circling The Burh, when the wind moves the treetops in the Sapling Forest, and there's a glimpse of a hare at the edge of the field.

On the other hand, being allowed to handle the heavy farm equipment makes him feel grown up - he's ten now, and strong. Besides, the plough turns up exciting and unexpected things sometimes, old debris carried here during the Disasters, when the floods and tidal waves reached all the way to the foot of The Burh. Time has buried the debris deep in the soil and sometimes brings it back to the surface. Mostly it's just rubbish, bits of ugly, dirty plastic or pieces of metal so rusty that Arthur can poke his finger through them, but some things can still be used. Stainless steel keeps fairly well in the soil, and pieces of wire like the one Arthur is picking up right now are good if they're not too rusty. Flat pieces of steel are good, too. They can be used for harrow tines or shaped, sharpened, and fitted with a wooden grip to be used as hand tools. 

Then there are other things that aren't useful at all but are just nice to look at or handle, or they spark Arthur's imagination. At home he has a collection of round, flat pieces of metal - coins from the old monetary system, Gaius has explained, from before the trading system they use today — and a good number of snakestones. The snakestones are petrified shells, Arthur's been told at school; shells trapped in rock. They were broken off cliffs and washed inland in the Disasters, and they're immensely old, from back when the world was pure.

"Can we use this for anything?" he asks, holding up the squiggly wire.

"We'll use it to mend the orchard fence," Uther says. "Put it in the haversack. We'll go and see Tom tomorrow, with those pieces of sheet metal we found the other day. See what he can do with them."

Arthur looks up eagerly at the word "we". "Can I come?"

Uther smiles down at him. "I thought you might like to."

"I do!" Arthur grins up at his father.

"Good. If we finish up here today, we can go tomorrow."

***

The next morning, Arthur and Uther set out on horseback to see Tom. He's the blacksmith in Chalkwell, and to get there they have to ride past Joyous Gard and past the east town gate of Glesting, then follow the north town wall for a good while.

It's a nice, cool morning without a cloud in the sky, and Arthur enjoys sitting astride Amelia's broad back in front of his father, moving along at a leisurely pace. He likes Tom - he's met him a couple of times when Tom's come to Cavalon with new horseshoes. Arthur’s also pleased not to have to go to school for another week. This is a busy time of year at the farms and all the farmers' children are on a two-week spring break to help with the work. 

"Here we are," Uther says, as they enter a small gravel yard with buildings on three sides. Arthur sees a cottage to the right, outbuildings to the left, and then the smithy itself, with its doors open.

The smithy is a dark cave filled with the flicker and heat of fire and the noise of clanging hammers. It's a tiny bit scary but kind of wonderful, too, with the smell of hot metal and the sizzle and steam as Tom dips a brand-new horseshoe into a bucket of water.

"Oh, hello, Uther," he says, fishing out the horseshoe with a pair of tongs.

"Tom." Uther gives him a nod.

No one in the world who doesn't know Uther would guess that he likes and respects Tom, but Arthur does know him well enough to see it.

"It's a nice morning we're having!"

Uther nods again.

"So, what can I do for you today?"

Arthur is curious to see how Tom will shape their metal scraps into tools and fit them with the wooden handles Uther's made, but something flashes by in the yard and there's an excited: "Ooh!"

A girl is standing by Amelia's head, holding the bridle with one hand and stroking the horse's nose with the other. Arthur has seen her at school but doesn't know her name; she's younger than he is and that's usually how it is: everyone always knows the names of the students older than themselves but not necessarily of the younger.

The gravel crunches under his feet as he walks up to her. "You like horses?"

"Oh, hi," the girl says, beaming. She's pretty with dark eyes and black, springy curls. "I _love_ horses! Dad does a lot of farrier work and I love it when the farmers bring their horses here. What's her name?"

"Amelia." Arthur pats Amelia's shiny, brown neck.

"That's a nice name! And she's lovely. She seems so gentle."

"She likes you."

"Does she? How can you tell?"

Arthur laughs. "If she didn't, you'd know by now."

"Oh." The girl laughs too. "I'm Gwen, by the way. And I already know you're Arthur."

"I've seen you at school but I didn't know Tom's your dad."

"You haven't been here before. You live at one of the farms by The Burh, don't you? South of The Burh?"

Arthur nods. "Cavalon."

"Are you here for new horseshoes?"

"No, we brought some stuff to make tools from. Your dad's good with that."

Gwen nods eagerly. "Yes, he is. He's good with a lot of things. He's taught me to make horseshoes, and to cook!"

"Is your mum…?"

Gwen looks down. "She's dead."

"I'm sorry," says Arthur awkwardly. He can't imagine what life would be like without Ygraine. "That must be hard."

"I miss her. But I think my brother Elyan misses her even more. I was so small when she died. He remembers her better. Oh, there he is."

A boy is standing in the doorway to the smithy, leaning on the doorpost. He's older than Arthur, fifteen perhaps, and looks a lot less friendly than his sister. Wary.

Gwen looks up at Arthur and smiles, changing the subject. "Are you going to be a farmer when you grow up, like your dad? Elyan and I are supposed to learn the trade and be blacksmiths like Dad, but I want to be a farrier because I'd love to work with horses. And Elyan doesn't want to do anything like that at all. He's in his final year at school and he wants to be a wanderer so he doesn't have to settle anywhere, only travel around and see new things!"

Elyan comes sauntering across the yard with his hands in his pockets, scowling. "Gwen, what are you doing talking to people about stuff like that? Didn't I tell you not to?"

"I'm not talking to _people_. I don't go talking about it in the _village_ or anything! I was just telling Arthur. It's true, isn't it? And Arthur's nice. He won't tell anyone."

"How do you know?"

"I won't," says Arthur, offended and hot with indignation. "I don't go around blabbing about other people's secrets!"

That makes one corner of Elyan's mouth go up a fraction. "You don't? Keep a lot of secrets, do you?"

Arthur shrugs. He does keep some, but he doesn't want to talk to Gwen's hostile brother about it.

A burst of laughter comes from the open door to the smithy. Apparently Tom has made Uther laugh, and Arthur likes him for it. Uther doesn't laugh nearly often enough.

"How do you know _Arthur_ is nice?" Elyan asks with acid emphasis on Arthur's name. "You know him?"

Gwen glares at him. "I don't _know_ know him, but I've seen him at school. He's in the year above me and he defended me that time when Melwas pushed me into the irrigation ditch and stole my lunch. He got it back for me but it was all wet and dirty so he gave me his own apple." She looks a little embarrassed. "You don't remember that, do you?"

Arthur frowns. "I do, but I didn't remember it was you getting pushed in the ditch." He grins at her. "Well, at least now I know that you didn't starve to death that day for missing lunch!"

She beams at him, and even Elyan's face softens. He looks much nicer when he smiles. Without taking his hands from his pocket he shoves at Arthur's shoulder with his elbow, but it's a friendly shove. "Hey, Arthur. Want to continue your girls' talk out here or come in and see some real work done?"

Gwen sticks her tongue out at her brother. " _I'm_ staying here anyway."

Elyan rolls his eyes. "What a surprise. When there are horses, you can't drag her away," he adds to Arthur as they go inside.

"She wants to be a farrier." Arthur is impressed. "That's hard work."

"It is, but she's tough. Tougher than she looks. Tougher than that day when you pulled her out of the ditch." Elyan glances down at Arthur. "Thanks, by the way."

Arthur shrugs again, with a grin this time.

***

Arthur hates collection day. That's when the Nim come to the farm to collect whatever food is available — vegetables, fruit, eggs, grain, cheese. There's even meat sometimes. The Nim are the High Priestess's guards, soldiers, and law enforcers. The Priestess's name is Nimueh, so her soldiers are the Nim.

When they come on their weekly rounds to collect food they're supposed to leave rations for the farmers, enough for them to sustain themselves so they can work, but when food is scarce the Nim often take everything there is. Food can't be created by magic and still needs to be grown, like it always has, but of course magicians don't want to do the hard work themselves. That's what magicless people are for. But even magicless people need to eat.

Regular collection days are bad enough, but the unannounced ones are worse. The unpleasant surprise visits. Punishment is meted out if the farmers have hidden or withheld food and are found out. Usually it's raps across the palms or knuckles, painful at the time they're received but also painful for days to come when they have to work with their hands swollen and sore. Sometimes the punishment consists of lowered rations or no rations at all. All the food the farm can produce is collected for several weeks, leaving the farmers to try and survive as best they can. 

Arthur is no stranger to being hungry. No farmer is.

The Nim soldier turning up unannounced today is new, with dark-blond curls, stubbly beard and a smile. He's younger than Cerdan, who usually collects from Cavalon and Joyous Gard. They eye him warily as they stand huddled together in the middle of the floor, Uther with an arm around each of his children and Ygraine by his side. What kind of Nim soldier will he turn out to be? Is he one of the strict rule-followers, who mostly leave enough food for the family to survive on, or one of those who love to be cruel? But he has kind eyes, Arthur thinks.

"So," the soldier says. "Who's doing the rounds with me?"

Some of the Nim want someone to go with them. Others just search through the farm on their own.

"I'll go," Ygraine says.

"Thank you. My name is Alvarr, by the way." He winks at Arthur and Morgana. "Don't be scared."

"He's weird," Arthur says when Alvarr and Ygraine have gone to check the chicken coop. "They're not usually so… nice. Don't you think that's weird?"

"Shh," says Uther. "Not now."

They stay where they are in silence until the rounds are done.

"That's all for today, then," Alvarr says. "I'll be back next week — regular collection day. See you then."

Ygraine just blinks, stunned.

When the door closes, Arthur and Morgana run up to the window and watch Alvarr cross the yard. The basket is swinging from his hand and it looks like he's whistling.

Ygraine wipes her forehead with the hem of her apron. "That was strange! My hands are shaking. He asked me whether the Nim leave us enough to eat. I said yes, they follow the rules and leave us the correct rations, because he'll probably report it to his superiors and and I didn't want to complain, but I don't think he believed me. He looked really doubtful when I said it."

There's a furrow between Uther's eyebrows. 

Ygraine smooths out her apron with her palms and takes a deep breath. "He left us more than they usually do. Not a lot, but there were some eggs in the coop that he pretended not to see, and then he dropped a loaf of bread in the pantry and didn't pick it up."

Uther looks grim. "I wonder if we dare eat it or if we'll be punished if we do. I'm sure he keeps tabs."

"We have to eat it," says Ygraine. "No one stands to gain from food lying around to spoil."

Uther scoffs. "Since when do the Nim operate with that much logic?"

But there is no punishment. Alvarr comes back the week after, on the regular day just like he said. This time he collects everything he is supposed to, but he still has a smile for them.

"He can't leave us food _every_ time," Morgana says, "or they'd notice he collects less than the other Nim."

Alvarr doesn't leave extra rations every week, but it's a regular enough occurrence. When Arthur talks to Lance about it, the DuLacs have a similar experience. They never mention it to Alvarr and neither does he. They're not scared of him, either. He's always polite and never threatens them, and he's not one of those Nim soldiers that Ygraine avoids being alone with.

For once, they seem to be in luck.

"At this rate we'll have to invite him for Yule," Uther says.

They all laugh. A Nim soldier at their Yule table — that'll be the day.

***

Arthur can't stop thinking about Gwen and Elyan. He sees Gwen at school but only says hello to her. He's a year older than she is and has his own friends, but whenever he sees her he thinks about her wanting to be a farrier.

Arthur has never really considered being anything but a farmer. It's true that he dreams about being someone who handles swords, and he knows Lance does the same because they talk about it sometimes, but they both know it's just that: a dream. Besides, Arthur likes working with the land and making things grow. That's what he'll do when he grows up: he'll take over the farm from Uther, like Uther took it over from Arthur's grandfather. It's both good and bad, knowing his own future. It's safe.

But sometimes it makes him feel trapped. Snared like a rabbit in the Sapling Forest. Reined in like Amelia.

Gwen's dream is of a different kind, more practical and doable. She wants to do what her father does, but only the part that interests her. She'll do it, too; Arthur is sure of it. For all her brightness and sweetness there's something determined about her.

Elyan doesn't want to follow in his father's footsteps at all. He wants to go wandering and see other things, _more_ things, leaving this small world behind. He wants to be free.

What's out there? What's there waiting to be discovered? Leon's told them about the mountains in the north, about the plains and lakes and cities. He's told them about the coastline, the long border between land and sea with rugged cliffs and crescents of golden sand. Arthur would like to see that one day.

His own world revolves around Cavalon Farm at the foot of The Burh. The Burh is the landmark around here — a hill with one lone oak tree at the top, a tree that's said to be hundreds of years old, a thousand perhaps. People call it the Fire Oak. It's gnarled and charred; the only tree Arthur has seen that survived the Disasters. Everything else was swept away by masses of water then, uprooted by hurricanes or burnt down by the wildfires that roared across the land.

From Leon and Freya, who know a lot about times past, Arthur knows the hill was once called the Tor and there was a tower at the top. The tower was destroyed in the Disasters, and when the ancient order was restored and the High Priestess took her throne, the hill was given an old name back: The Burh.

Floods and tidal waves destroyed most towns and villages — Glesting as well, the nearest town to Cavalon, and the magician's town of Strate on the other side of the River Bru. They've both been rebuilt since, much smaller than they were before the Disasters. The sea swallowed up a lot of land along parts of the coast to the west and southwest of Strate and turned it into salt marshes. Arthur has never seen them. He has dangled his feet in the river but never crossed it, and the farthest he's been from Cavalon is the west town gate of Glesting.

He's never been told about any of this at school. History lessons only tell them in general terms about how magicless people destroyed the world with their greed and wasteful ways. After the Disasters there was a new order, a new rule, and a return of the world to the ancient ways, the proper way of living, with magicians in their rightful place. This is the world as it was meant to be. 

Arthur only wonders why, for people like him, it has to be so small.

When he stands by the Fire Oak at the top of The Burh and looks towards the west, he can see something in the far distance that must be the sea. Beyond the green and yellow of the fields and the darker green of trees, far beyond Glesting, there's a ribbon of bright light that must be sun on water. The sea is just water, water stretching as far as the eye can see, Leon says. Arthur can't picture that much water in one place, but he thinks that if the sun glitters in lots and lots of water and you see it from a distance, then it must look like this. Like a ribbon of bright light.

One day he wants to cross the River Bru and see Strate and the salt marshes beyond. One day he wants to follow the river all the way to the sea.


	3. Stone

Winters are boring.

There's no work in the fields, only schoolwork and feeding the animals, mending farm equipment and patching up the house so the roof doesn't leak. The days are short and the evenings long. After the magic mains are switched off there are oil lamps and beeswax candles and a few solar-battery lamps, but all of those need to be used sparingly. 

They go to bed early in winter.

But winter time also means story time, singing time, when they sit by the woodburning stove watching firelight flicker behind the lace-patterned, cast-iron door. Every time Leon visits, he leaves them with more stories, more songs, tales of countries far away. Countries swallowed up by water or devastated by fire long ago, Uther points out dryly, but Leon only hums and launches into yet another story.

Arthur, Morgana and Lance still have the swords Leon made them years ago - six years ago; half of Arthur's life. It feels like they've always had them. They practice in the barn sometimes, where they have space to move properly and won't be seen. Whenever Leon is around, he always takes the time to instruct them. They're all pretty good by now. Uther doesn't like the swords, and once or twice on a cold winter's day he has threatened to use them for firewood, but so far it hasn't happened.

The swords have to be kept secret. Farmers aren't allowed weapons or anything that can be used as a weapon, unless approved by the Nim. Uther owns a Nim-approved, Nim-registered rifle for defence of the farm. Swords would never be approved, even ones made of wood, so they remain well hidden in the barn by means of some concealing charms Morgana was taught by Freya.

Leon's stories have to be kept secret, too, and Ygraine still reminds the children of this as she tucks them in.

Arthur is too old for her to sing to him, but he still likes it when Ygraine sits on the edge of his bed for a minute before he goes to sleep. 

"Why do we have to keep quiet about it?" he asks her one night. "I suppose I can see why we're not allowed to have swords, but what's so dangerous about Leon's stories?"

Ygraine frowns. "Magicians don't want to talk about the time when magicless people ruled the world."

"But we have history class at school. They talk about it then."

"Sometimes Leon's stories differ from theirs," says Ygraine softly, "and they don't like it. They prefer their own."

Arthur can't let it go. "I don't see why that would be forbidden, though."

"Well…" Ygraine leans down to kiss his forehead. "Because sometimes words are more powerful than swords."

***

 

"Kneel before me!" Morgana shouts dramatically, brandishing her sword. "Admit defeat!"

They're practising in the barn. By now they've outgrown their swords so it's a bit ridiculous, more like fighting with daggers than with swords, but it's still fun. Leon has promised to make them new and better ones when he has the time. He's started on one for Morgana and they can tell it's going to be beautiful.

Lance glares at her. "I'm sure you used your magic! It's not fair!"

"I did not!" Morgana stops and pokes him in the chest with the blunt point of her sword. "It's all down to my superior swordswomanship."

Lance rolls his eyes. "Fine, but I'm not kneeling!"

Morgana laughs, and even if Arthur is on Lance's side on principle, he can't stop a grin. He's about to say something when the door creaks on its hinges and they fall silent, hiding the swords behind their backs. If it's a Nim soldier, they're in trouble.

A small face peers around the door. "Hi, can I come in?"

"Hello, Gwen," Arthur says, raising his eyebrows and looking around at the others questioningly. When they both nod, he adds: "Come in and close the door."

"I'm here with Dad," she says as she shuts the door behind her. "Leon told me you were in here. He said you were practising with your swords."

They glance at each other. If Leon told her, it must be okay. It means he trusts her.

She smiles eagerly up at them. "I have one, too!"

Morgana smiles back. "That's great! Did Leon make it for you? Here's mine. I was only eight when he made it for me so it's a bit small, but isn't it pretty? Look at the grip. He's good at wood carving."

Gwen is shaking her head. "No, Dad made mine."

"Your dad?" Arthur asks, awed. "So it's made of metal?"

"Yeah, it's heavy but I like it. Leon says it's very well balanced."

"Wow!" Lance is as impressed as Arthur is. "You have a _real_ sword?"

"Yes! I have it here, if you want to see. Freya made it invisible for me so I could take it with me. She said Morgana would be able to make it visible again."

It's a beautiful sword with a tapered groove along the flat of the blade, an ornate hilt and a strip of leather wound around the grip. They pass it between them, weigh it in their hands and hold it up to feel its balance.

"I'd love to have one like this," Arthur says longingly as he hands it back to Gwen.

"Do you get to practise with it?" Morgana asks.

"Leon always practices with me when he visits," Gwen says. "He's such a good teacher! He says he practices with you, too."

"Want to go up against me?" Arthur says teasingly, challenging her. "To see if you're any good. You'll have to use one of our swords because there's only one like yours. Are you up for it?"

Gwen nods eagerly, not intimidated at all. "Yes! Can I try one first, so I can get used to it a bit?"

When Arthur sees her dancing around on light feet with Morgana's sword, attacking and guarding, he begins to doubt the wisdom of his challenge. He bites his lip. She _is_ good.

"Okay," she says, "I've got it now! Are you ready?"

Ten minutes later, panting and annoyed, Arthur is forced to admit defeat. Gwen beams, Morgana is laughing her head off, and Lance seems unsure whose side to be on.

Just as Gwen opens her mouth to say something, Tom calls her from the yard. "Gwen! Gwen, are you there? We have to get going."

"Okay!" Gwen calls back. She turns to Morgana. "Can you make my sword invisible again, Morgana? Thanks so much for letting me practice with you! See you at school!"

"Beaten by a small girl," Morgana says when Gwen's left, "and how! Really, Arthur."

Arthur's annoyance has dispersed and he's more impressed than anything. "Not just any girl, though, Morgana. You have to admit she's something."

"She's better than any of us," Lance agrees with admiration in his voice. "And I'd love to have a sword like that."

"Me too," Arthur says. "Maybe one day we can all have real swords."

***

It's a perfectly ordinary winter until an outbreak of influenza in Glesting spreads rapidly through the surrounding farms.

Arthur and Morgana spend two weeks in bed with raging fever, sore throats and a horrible, chesty cough that keeps everyone awake at night. Once they're on the mend, Ygraine falls ill.

Neither of them can remember their mother ever staying in bed all day. Everything feels strange and wrong. It's too quiet. Usually Ygraine is in the kitchen humming to herself and preparing breakfast when they emerge from their rooms in the morning. Now they make their own breakfast and eat in silence, hunching their shoulders against the oppressive hush in the house, punctuated by bouts of coughing from the bedroom. Arthur and Morgana tiptoe in to give their mother a kiss before they leave for school.

Eventually the fever subsides, and one day when they come home from school Ygraine is up and smiling, preparing dinner. It's as if the sun's come out after a month of rain. 

A few days later the fever is back on a slow burn and her cough changes character.

Uther fetches the doctor from town and they all gather silently around Ygraine's bed while the doctor listens to her chest.

"You have pneumonia," he says, straightening up and folding his stethoscope. "You need hydration and plenty of rest."

Uther's face doesn't change but his knuckles whiten as he grips the bedpost. "Rest. Is there nothing you can give her? No medicine at all?"

Arthur and Morgana edge closer to each other and clasp hands. They have never heard their father sound like that before. Pleading. Desperate, almost.

"I'm sorry." The doctor looks at Ygraine and shakes his head. "The truth is there isn't much medicine to be had for anything at all. Not for us at St Kea, in any case. There's the most desperate shortage of medical supplies. Everything goes to Bodunni. I'm afraid we'll just have to wait it out."

Arthur swallows. Of course everything goes to Bodunni. That's the big hospital in Strate, the hospital for magicians. St Kea is for people like him - small and poor on the outskirts of Glesting. 

"But you're young and strong," the doctor adds to Ygraine, "and I'm sure you'll pull through. Most adults do, after all."

Uther's jaw clenches but he says nothing. 

Ygraine reaches for his hand. "Most people get well, Uther. The doctor says so. And so will I."

Without replying, Uther leans down and kisses her hair. Morgana's face is pinched and white. She lets go of her brother's hand and turns away to the window, staring out at nothing. It falls to Arthur to see the doctor out.

"As for payment…" the doctor says as they're standing by the door.

Arthur bites his lip. Why hasn't his father settled this? He's always so prompt about payment.

"How much?" Arthur dreads the reply.

The doctor gives him a weak smile and shrugs. "Well… at this time of the year, no one has much to spare. What can you give me?"

In the pantry, Arthur looks around the nearly empty shelves. He has no idea what a doctor's visit would normally cost but collects some herbs for infusions and a loaf of bread from this week's batch, and holds it out to the doctor, eyeing him anxiously. "I hope this will do."

The doctor takes it and nods. He looks tired. "That will do nicely. Thank you."

Back in the bedroom, Uther is kneeling by the bed with his forehead on Ygraine's shoulder. Her eyes are closed and her breathing shallow. By the window, Morgana has turned around to face the room. Her mouth is a hard line and there's a look in her eyes that Arthur has never seen before, that makes him shudder. Darker than dark.

He sits gingerly on the bed by his mother's feet and pats the bedspread over her legs. His hand looks small and rough and lost on top of the fabric. No one says anything because there isn't much to say.

A week later, Ygraine dies. 

***

Nothing goes right this year. First there's a night of frost that takes most of the fruit bloom. Then the rain begins, and Uther worries about the hay rotting in the fields. The kitchen gardens are sodden with rain. The greenhouse fares better but the Nim come to collect most of what they produce.

The lines around Uther's mouth are carved deep. "At this rate, it will be a hard winter."

Two weeks after the Beltane feast, poor and subdued this year, Lance's father drowns by the watermill. It falls on Uther to break the bad news to Lance and his mother. Arthur asks to come. He wants to be there for Lance.

"I don't know what we'll do," Elaine whispers, white-faced.

Uther rubs a hand over his tired face. "It's a bad year. We'll just have to help each other as best we can."

***

It's a misty morning when Uther and Arthur take the dirt track up to the North Field.

"I'll do some work on the drystone wall," Uther says, "if you take care of the field."

Arthur walks slowly through the field, scanning it for things that don't belong there, like wild oats or rocks. A third of the field is done when he sees something rock-like poking out of the dark earth. One more for Uther's wall.

On his knees on the ground, he moves damp earth aside with his hands to dig it out. But it isn't a rock — it's a triangular piece of stone with one rough, uneven edge and two smooth ones, like a corner broken off a larger slab of stone. The surface has been tooled, carved with a pattern worn by time and the elements until it's hard to make out exactly what it is. Arthur tries to brush it clean and follows the pattern with his fingertips. 

There's an ornamental border of some kind of flowers, roses perhaps, and something that looks like a crown. The stone must be very old, and touching it makes him feel like he needs to hold his breath. It reminds him, he realises, of Leon's stories of old, of kings and queens and heroes.

"Arthur, what is it? Are you hurt?" Uther calls from the drystone wall.

Arthur stands. "No, Dad! I'm fine. I just found something. You should come and have a look."

Uther comes down the slope in big strides and crouches down to examine Arthur's find. "Hmm. It looks old."

"It's nice, don't you think?"

"Yes, it is. Let's put it in the stone wall as a decorative piece." 

But Arthur stops his father with a hand on his arm. "No, wait. I was thinking…"

"Yes?"

Arthur swallows. "Well… there's no headstone on Mum's grave. Only that little cross. I was thinking we could put this on her grave. You know, just flat in the grass, in front of the cross."

Uther stands slowly and looks at the piece of stone by his feet in silence. Then he pulls Arthur to him and hugs him. Arthur is so tall now that his nose is pressed against his father's chest, above his heart. Uther smells of sweat and herbal soap. He never used to hug his children much. Ygraine was the one who hugged them.

"That's a nice thought, Arthur," says Uther above his son's head. He sounds a little choked. "Let's do that." He lets Arthur go, holds him at arm's length and meets his eyes. "I'll take it up to the stone wall now, and we'll bring it to the graveyard next time we go. Is that a good plan?"

Arthur nods. He likes the thought of placing something on his mother's grave other than just the small wooden cross. Something more permanent. Something beautiful.

***

One afternoon late in the summer, Arthur is climbing trees in the orchard with Lance. They're strictly not allowed to do this, but as there's very little fruit this year, they climb.

Arthur has just dared Lance to go up on the highest branch when they spot a Nim soldier crossing the farmhouse yard. Their eyes meet. Nim soldiers are never good news, except for Alvarr. He's still as nice as he was that first time.

"It's not collection day," Arthur whispers. "Cerdan was here two days ago." 

The soldier raps the door with his knuckles and the boys scramble down from the tree. Arthur barely notices scraping his shin.

When they run into the house, panting, the Nim soldier is standing in the middle of the floor with his hands on his back and his feet apart. Uther has a bowl in his hands and seems not to notice he's holding it, as if he's been frozen mid-movement. Morgana is standing by the table, frowning.

The Nim soldier tells them stiffly that as Morgana is now fourteen, she can attend the magical school for her last two school years if she chooses. He recommends that she does. "It won't cost you anything," he says. "The school is well funded."

Morgana looks thunderstruck. Shadows of rage and contempt flit across Uther's face as he fights to hold back his words, his mouth working as if they taste bad and he wants to spit. 

The soldier watches him coldly. "Think carefully, Pendragon. You'll all be better off. Your daughter will have free board and tuition and you'll have a mouth less to feed." After a pause, he adds as if he's been itching to say it the entire time: "And she'll have a proper education. One that befits someone with magic. She'll be where she belongs."

Morgana, who hasn't uttered a squeak, stares at him with wide, shocked eyes, and Arthur sees the pulse flutter at the base of her throat.

"I'll be back the day after tomorrow for a reply," the Nim soldier says.

Ignoring Uther and the boys, he gives Morgana a nod and leaves.

The silence in the kitchen is deafening as the door closes behind him, and they don't quite want to look at each other. 

_An education that befits someone with magic._

Not since that day when Arthur and Morgana were little, when Morgana had had her first history lesson, has she said anything about her being better than the rest of the family, being _above_ them. Now a Nim soldier has stomped in and pointed out that she is different, that there are opportunities available to her that will never be open to them, a whole new world waiting out there if she chooses to leave them. A world where she belongs and they don't.

When the silence begins to press on their eardrums, Uther says gruffly: "Sleep on it, Morgana. Think it through once you're rested."

Morgana reaches out and touches his arm. "Dad. Dad! Look at me." When he does, reluctantly, she looks up into his eyes: "Dad, listen to me. If you want me to stay here, I'll stay. You and Arthur are my family and of course I don't want to leave you, but — the Nim soldier has a point. You see that, don't you? There _will_ be one mouth less to feed if I go, and with most of the harvest being lost... I might be able to help you if I do this, Dad. Better than I can if I stay here. I'll learn new things, things that could be good for the farm and for us. And I'm thinking that maybe… maybe I'll get access to things. Medicine. Food. Things we can't get hold of now. Things that could… that could have saved Mum."

Uther flinches visibly, turning away. "You have to decide for yourself," he says indistinctly. "I'm off to patrol the Forest."

Arthur stares at the door closing behind his father, and then at Morgana. Her eyes are dark and there's a crease between her eyebrows.

"Why does he _do_ that? Why does he always walk away when something is hard to talk about? I hate it when he does! There's no need to patrol the Forest now, not after Freya taught me how to put wards around it." She turns to Arthur. "Don't look at me like that. I had to say that — about Mum, I mean. It's the truth. She could have been saved if we'd had medicine. If they'd _let her have_ medicine."

Arthur swallows a big lump in his throat. First his mother, now Morgana. She'll be gone too and Uther and he will be left to fend for themselves as best they can. "We can't change that now."

"No," says Morgana grimly. "But we can stop that kind of thing from happening again."


	4. Leaves

"Are you really going to go?" Arthur asks as he picks up a small branch and swats at the long grass.

Morgana doesn't reply at first. The wind is whipping her loose hair about her face and she makes a show of gathering it up and making a plait down her back, tying it at the end with a piece of string. Buying herself time. "Yes," she says at long last.

They're on their way to the Sapling Forest to set some rabbit snares and see what they can forage. Hopefully there'll be mushrooms after the rains.

There's still not much to eat and the harvest is lost. They've gone to bed with their stomachs growling more times than they can count. Some farms have had break-ins, they've heard - people are desperate for food, but there's none to be had anywhere. Cavalon and Joyous Gard are better off than some. They have the Sapling Forest where they can hunt, and find mushrooms and berries and edible plants. 

Morgana's had magic lessons from Freya, and with the help of her freshly learned invisibility magic she and Arthur made a new vegetable patch at the far end of the orchard. It's visible only to the family — anyone else will only see grass. There's kale, radishes and onions, whatever would grow this late in the season.

People are worse off in town, where they have no more than their tiny back gardens and the weekly market to rely on. It's been a while since there was anything to buy at the market.

When they reach the edge of the Sapling Forest it begins to rain, a soft drizzle that makes the air grey.

The Sapling Forest is a bit of a misnomer. The saplings aren't saplings any more but fully grown trees, nor is it a forest as such — it's not large enough to deserve the name. It grew here after the Disasters, when nature rearranged and re-established itself, and in summer it looks like a small, green lake lapping at the shores of the grassy Burh. Most of the Forest is on Cavalon's land but some of it, the westernmost part, belongs to Joyous Gard. They're protective of it, and before Morgana's wards, they sometimes had to patrol it to stop people poaching or chopping down trees for firewood.

"So you've decided?" Arthur won't let it go.

" _Yes_ ," Morgana says. "Stop pestering me. Let's go up here and see if we can find some girolles."

By the time they reach the other side of the forest, halfway up the slopes of The Burh, they've set four snares and found girolles, wild mint and sand leek, and some chicken of the woods.

The few watery bilberries they found went straight into their mouths.

"I think we've done pretty well," says Morgana. "Let's rest before we head back."

She points to a fallen tree and they sit down on the trunk. The drizzle has stopped but there's mist in the air.

"Why do we have to set snares?" Arthur asks. "Can't you use your magic to hunt?"

Morgana makes a face. "I can, but using magic to kill is… I don't know how to explain it. It _hurts_."

"Hurts how? I don't like killing things either. I mean, who does?"

Morgana raises an eyebrow and looks at him in that big-sisterly way that makes him feel five years old. "Well, I'm sorry to smash your innocence to pieces, Arthur, but there are definitely people in this world who enjoy killing."

He grabs a handful of moss and leaves from the ground and throws it at her face.

She ducks, grinning. "See what I mean? You have no arguments, so you have to rely on violence."

He throws another handful and she laughs. "Attacking me with _leaves_ , Arthur? Ooo, I'm so scared."

He glares at her. "Seriously, though. You won't use magic to hunt because you don't like it? I don't like hunting either, and neither does Dad, but we still have to do it."

"Well, it's not just that I don't _like_ it. Killing does something to the magic." She frowns. "Drains it. Distorts it. I can't describe it."

"I still don't get it. Why is it okay for you to set snares, then? That's still killing."

"It's not _okay_ for me any more than it is for you, but it doesn't warp my magic."

Arthur puts the back of his hand on his forehead dramatically. "I can't have my magic warped, I'm so _special_!"

It's Morgana's turn to glare and throw leaves, and Arthur laughs until he remembers that in another week's time, his sister will be gone. 

"Why did you decide to go, Morgana?" he asks. "To the magic school, I mean."

Morgana opens her mouth to say something, but instead she stands and waves her hand in an arc above them, then in another arc crossing the other, drawing the shape of a dome above them and whispering something before she sits down again.

"I just soundproofed us. I don't think there's anyone here who could hear us but I want to be on the safe side."

This sounds serious. Arthur sits straighter, waiting for whatever will come.

"I want to see what it's like," Morgana says. "What _they're_ like. The magicians. I want to see how they live and hear how they talk about us - the farmers, I mean. If they talk about us at all. I guess for most of them, we don't even exist." She smiles a little. "You know, it's like Leon used to say when he told us stories about wars and spies: Get to know your enemy. That's what I'm going to do."

Arthur picks up a twig and pokes at the ground. "You think they're the enemy?" He adds in a low voice: "But you're one of them."

He half expects her to be angry but she just sits in silence.

"Well," she says at long last, "I am and I'm not. I have magic but I'm not one of them. I don't know if I can ever be and I'm not sure I want to be. They're so... indifferent. They use the Nim like a… like a shield to protect themselves from us. They send the Nim to deal with us so they won't have to. I want to know how they think." She takes a breath. "This is something I'd never get to see otherwise, Arthur. I can learn something from this. I want to change the world one day, and to be able to do that, I have to find out about magicians first. What their life is like. Now I can. It's a once in a lifetime chance."

"And one less mouth to feed."

"That, too."

"But that means that there are two less hands as well. Two less hands to do the work."

Morgana's shoulders slump. "I know. But I think I'll be able to help in a different way. If I go to the magical school I can go to the magical shops as well. Maybe I can send you food, or medicine."

"Where is the school, do you know?"

Morgana nods. "Micelenie. It's an isle deep into the marshlands south of Strate."

"That's far. Will you be able to come home for your breaks?" It makes Arthur sad to think about it. The house will be so empty without his sister.

Morgana grins at that, as if he just said something funny. "I asked Freya about travelling once, and she said there are many ways to travel when you have magic. I think what they'll do is open a portal for us and we can just step through. I'll be home in two seconds."

It's so wondrous and so unfair at the same time that Arthur chokes on his emotions. Morgana will go to a new school and get to do things Arthur could never dream of. She can travel by stepping through magical portals. She'll get to see the world and he'll just go on ploughing the fields year after year, and get no further away from Cavalon than he is now - halfway up The Burh. All the way up to the top if he feels adventurous.

"You'll change," he says darkly. "The school will change you. Maybe you'll become just like them and then you won't want to help us at all. You'll be ashamed to have grown up at a farm and you won't want to know us."

He had expected Morgana to laugh at him but she doesn't. 

"That's not going to happen," she says softly. "Friends forever, Arthur." She pulls him into a hug. "We'll always look out for each other. Promise."

She remembers. Perhaps they've never needed their old promise as much as they do today. Arthur nods with his chin on her shoulder. "I promise. Always."

***

One afternoon before Samhain, on the last day of school before the autumn break, Arthur walks home with Lance as always. It's getting cold and they're walking slowly to preserve energy, trying to ignore how hungry they are. Most of the fields are brown and bare because grain is scarce. Only the North Field has been sown, combining the last grains of winter wheat from Cavalon and Joyous Gard. It's bright green against the autumn-coloured Forest.

Suddenly Morgana is there at the edge of the field, just by the roadside. There's a kind of wobble in the air around her, as if it's not air but water, and she brushes at her arms like she's getting rid of cobwebs. Looking up, she spots them and waves, breaking into a run.

"Arthur!" She hugs her brother first, then Lance. "Lance! It's so good to see you both." When she takes a step back and looks them up and down, her face changes. "Oh. The food situation isn't any better, is it?"

Arthur shakes his head, unable to speak. When he sees Morgana standing before him he realises how bedraggled Lance and he must look. She looks so _healthy_. Her hair is shiny and she's changed its style, her skin glows and she has new clothes, with finer cloth and better stitching than any Arthur has ever seen. It's obvious she's eaten well and slept well and been taken good care of. 

Two months, and she's already changed. There's already a gulf between her and them.

"Let's go home," she says. When they reach the fork of the road down to Joyous Gard, she stops and nods towards the house. "I've brought some food. Lance, would you go and get Elaine? Then we can all eat together."

Morgana picks some late-blooming flowers along the road and puts them in a glass of water on the table. It's been a long time since they had flowers in the house. She's brought a whole ham, a loaf of wholegrain bread and some fruit, and they heat up what's left of yesterday's batch of thin soup.

"Thank you," says Elaine when they've eaten, reaching out and squeezing Morgana's hand. "That was one of the best meals I've ever had."

Morgana looks down on her hands. "I'm sorry I couldn't do more. We're only allowed to buy a limited amount at the shops — I mean, we students. Other magicians can buy whatever they want." She gets up and finds her bag. "I do have a few more things though." She digs in it and fishes out some packages that she places on the table. "Most importantly — chocolate!"

Lance and Arthur cheer.

"Painkillers. Antiseptic cream."

They stare at the pristine packages, small and white with sharp, clean corners, completely alien on their rough, worn table, completely unattainable to anyone who doesn't have magic. Arthur can't even imagine what a shop where you can buy something like that would look like.

"Can't magicians cure stuff like that themselves?" Lance asks. "If you have a headache, why do you need a pill?"

"Well, we can cure some things." Morgana frowns. "We can certainly take care of a headache. But different people have different gifts, so maybe not everyone can. Anyway, this is what I could rustle up."

When Lance and Elaine have left, Uther lights a fire in the woodburning stove and they sit around it in silence, watching the firelight. Everything and nothing is like it used to be. They've sat like this many times but so much has changed now, and if Morgana already feels like a stranger, what will it be like in two years?

Later, when they're getting ready for bed, Morgana comes up to Arthur and nudges him with her elbow.

"What?"

She smiles a little and says: "Always."


	5. Cloud

Aglain takes a step back and stops, arms akimbo, to take a proper look at the shiny new glass structure. His red tunic is bright in the sun. He never wears the blue uniform of the Nim any more, like he doesn't want to be associated with them. The sun is beating down, transforming all the glass panes into separate, small suns.

"It's a marvel," Morgana says, shading her eyes and smiling up at Aglain.

Arthur and Uther don't say anything at all, just look at their new greenhouse. They still can't believe it actually here now, done, waiting to be used. Neither of them really thought it would happen. It was far more likely that the Nim would change their mind.

The arrival of Aglain has changed their lives — everyone's life. The first time he came to the farm he was a collector. They saw him as another Alvarr, a rare Nim soldier who was always kind and always careful not to take too much of their food away. Then one day he came back wearing a red cloak rather than the blue one of the Nim, and told them he'd been appointed to be a magic/non-magic liaison.

"It's a victory," he had said, "getting them to agree to this. It's entirely necessary and will make life better on all fronts. For you, for them. We all stand to gain from this."

"This" had turned out to be more efficient farming. Now, both Cavalon and Joyous Gard have brand-new solar panels on their roofs, giving them their own source of electricity, which, in turn, makes them less dependent on the magical mains. They have lamps at night and a luxury unheard of - hot water whenever they want it.

"I had to explain why good lighting at night would be a good thing," Aglain had said and laughed. "I told them it meant you could work longer hours. I'm sure you work those hours already, but are spoiling your eyesight in the process."

The solar panels are wonderful, but the hydroponics house is the greatest thing of all. Joyous Gard is getting one too, but Cavalon's is the first one to be built. Other farmers have been here to look at it. The Nim have been here to inspect it, reacting with various degrees of like or dislike. To the farmers it truly is a marvel. With grow lights and climate control, made possible by the solar panels, they'll be able to grow vegetables all year. There are pumps and drainage and sand beds for water purification, so they can re-use the water. It's _technology_ like they've never seen before.

As if he can sense what they're thinking, Aglain says: "Not all technology developed before the Disasters was bad. We're told all of it was destructive but of course that's not true, and in my opinion, we should make use of the things that weren't."

"Come and have a bite to eat with us," Uther says. It's the first words he's uttered since the hydroponics house was officially finished.

"Thank you," Aglain says. He looks pleased, with the invitation and with himself, having seen the project through to success. "I'd like that."

It's been a good year with a good crop, and the kitchen garden is still yielding produce. There's even a cake made with honey from Gaius. Arthur makes peppermint tea and they sit down at the table. The door to the hydroponics house is open — that's new, too, giving them direct access from the kitchen to the greenhouse. It will save energy in winter if they don't keep letting in cold air, Aglain says, and they'll get better results if the temperature is even.

"Thank you," says Uther to Aglain. "I still find it hard to believe this is happening. That someone would actually help us. That someone would _want_ to help us."

"Well!" Aglain leans back on his chair, swallowing the last of his slice of cake. "It would never have happened if Scamall hadn't already decided to build fences around the towns and villages. Someone had to tell them it was a bad idea — without saying exactly that, of course." He laughs. "You can't be too direct with these people. And you always have to show them how your suggestion will work to their advantage."

Arthur almost drops his beaker, saving it at the last minute. Morgana and Uther stare at Aglain.

Scamall is the capital, the palace, the temple and court of the High Priestess, and the Nim headquarters. They have never heard anyone talk about it like this. Criticising it, even. It's a dangerous thing to do.

That doesn't stop Aglain. "Magical fences — that was the best they could come up with to stop the thefts from the farms. Magical fences to keep the townspeople in the towns. I had to tell them that what we're seeing here are only symptoms, not the root of the evil. Poverty and starvation, that's where we have to start. If people have bread on the table they won't need to steal from the farms and each other's gardens."

"Have another slice," Morgana says and cuts the cake for him. 

Aglain breaks the slice in half and puts one half back on the plate. He's eaten with them before and always seems to balance between wanting to say yes and having to say no because he doesn't want to take their food away from them. Today seems different. The hydroponics house is ready and they'll be better able to feed themselves. 

"But the decision had already been made," he continues, "so I had to make the best of it. I pointed out to them that they'd need to direct a lot of magic to the new fences, to power them up. You know about the power plants, I presume. The nearest one from here is at Brigg, halfway to the coast."

They all nod. This is an extraordinary conversation. They're not supposed to know where the power plants are located.

"Weren't they prisons originally?" Uther ventures to ask.

"They still are. They were regular prisons for magicians until someone figured out that the prisoners could be drained of their magic, hooked up to feed the magical mains. It was considered a supreme humiliation: magicians forced to use their magic to provide for the magicless, the workers, the farmers. That's why magicians like to use magicless punishment, like beatings or whippings: it's not only painful, but humiliating."

Morgana looks shaken. "It happened at school sometimes, when punishment was meted out. Your magic was taken away from you, or blocked, so you couldn't defend yourself. Then you were rapped across the knuckles or the palm, or beaten. We were told this system was used widely to punish criminals but I couldn't believe that was true. It is, then."

"Oh, yes," Aglain says. "The power plants are full of dissidents. People who opposed the High Priestess, who opposed Scamall."

The word "scamall" means "cloud" in the old language, and the place is said to look like a cloud — a cloud of magic, containing an entire city. It doesn't have a fixed geographical location but travels around the country, floating above the ground, never settling in one place for more than a few nights at a time. Arthur has never seen it, only heard about it. It's been many years since it came to this part of the country, but Leon has seen it on his wanderings and told them how beautiful it is. Even Leon hasn't been inside, of course. Very few people are invited, certainly not magicless people, even if there are rumours of magicless servants in Scamall. Slaves.

Arthur is too stunned to ask questions or say anything at all. He has never heard anyone talk like Aglain does. Maybe this is how you dare to think and speak if you were born with magic and grew up among magicians. Maybe he would speak like this too, if he'd grown up free.

Because that's how it feels. If you're magicless, you're not free.

"I never knew there were that many," Morgana whispers. "So many people opposing Scamall. A whole prison full of them?"

"Several prisons," says Aglain dryly. "Yes, there are many. More than you'd think. There are those who speak out — and they often end up in one of the power plants around the country - but for every person who speaks out there are many more who don't, who only talk about it quietly, in the privacy of their homes, or don't speak of it at all because it's dangerous."

"But _you_ do," Morgana says. "You speak out, and you're alive."

When she looks at Aglain, her eyes are filled with admiration.

He laughs. "Yes, I'm alive — for now, because I also work _with_ them. I'm working for their good as well as yours. But you're right, Morgana. Their benignity towards me could change at any moment, so I'm going to make the most of it while I can. And solar panels and hydroponics are a very good beginning."

***

"Aglain offered me the chance to work with him," Morgana says at breakfast some days later. "It would be like an apprenticeship."

Uther sets his beaker down and pushes his plate aside very deliberately, lifting his eyes to hers and fixing her with his gaze. "Do you have too much spare time here at the farm, Morgana?" he asks acidly. "Do you need more tasks? Because I'm sure that can be arranged."

"Aglain says we need more liaisons," Morgana replies calmly. "He says I'm ideally positioned to do it. I have magic and I've grown up on a farm."

Uther gives her a dark stare, his eyebrows almost meeting above his nose. "Does he now? Well, I'm sure he can find someone else. You're needed here, at the farm."

"But I'd really like to do it, Dad! It's not full time or anything. I'd still be able to do my share here."

"It's out of the question, Morgana. We're not discussing this any more. You're staying here and that's final."

Arthur finishes his herbal tea, looking from his father to his sister and back again, wondering if he should go outside and get Amelia ready. The dangerous spark in Morgana's eyes doesn't bode well, but he wants to hear how this argument ends.

"It would be a good thing," she says in an ominously low voice. "I could do good work, work that would benefit us as well. Aglain does good work, doesn't he? I know you like him."

"Aglain is a good man," says Uther gruffly. "That doesn't mean I want to have you dangling after him like a tail!"

"What?" Morgana is halfway up from her chair but thinks better of it and sits back down. "I wouldn't be a _tail_! I'd be an apprentice. You know what that word means, don't you, Dad?"

Arthur bites his lip, leaning back from the table. If Morgana is pulling the education card, there's going to be thunder.

"What are you insinuating, Morgana?"

"Nothing! I'm just saying I'd go with Aglain to all the farms and to Glesting and Strate, maybe even to Scamall. I'd be there to see and learn, and in a year or two I could work as liaison on my own. Don't you think it's a good thing, Dad, to have people representing us farmers to the Nim?"

"And vice versa, Morgana," says Uther coldly. "Don't forget that. You'd be working for the Nim as well. You'd be half theirs and half ours, and in my opinion that could never end well. You're sixteen years old and I'm your father. If I tell you to stay here, you stay." He pauses, holding up a hand. "If you still want to go and work with Aglain a year from now, and if he still wants to take you on as an apprentice, you can go. Until then, you stay."

Morgana opens her mouth and closes it again, looking at Arthur for support, but he only shrugs. This is Morgana's problem and her fight. He doesn't know what his own fight will be yet, but he has a feeling it will come. At least Morgana has options. When that day comes for Arthur, he's not sure he will.

He gets up, puts his plate and beaker in the sink and heads out to get the horse ready.

***

"Scamall's coming," Alvarr says. "There'll be an official announcement soon."

He's done the rounds with Morgana and Arthur's just back from school, washing his hands at the sink. Something in Alvarr's voice makes him turn around. 

Alvarr meets his eyes, then Morgana's, and nods slowly. "So you should maybe… you should… well." He clears his throat. "The official announcement will be tomorrow, or so I'm told. I'd better go."

"We should maybe _what_?" says Arthur irritably when Alvarr has left. "I hate it when people just hint at things."

Morgana sighs. "He meant to warn us, Arthur. We should lay low. You know. Not talk about certain things. Not be seen with Aglain. And I think we should put some food aside, because Scamall is likely to take everything."

"Not be seen with Aglain? I thought he was in with those people at Scamall." Arthur dries his hands on a linen towel, wondering why he's getting so angry.

"He's probably not their favourite person, Arthur, pushing them to make life easier for the magicless."

"Good thing Dad wouldn't let you work with him, then. We'd all be for the chop. Have you checked on the hydroponics today? I'm going up to the Forest to help Dad."

Morgana runs after him when he stomps out. "What's the matter with you? You act as if, I don't know, something is my fault. Nothing's happened. Nothing's going to happen. And yes, I checked on the hydroponics."

"Sorry," he mutters. "I'm just edgy. Something feels weird."

"What does?"

He shrugs. "I don't know. I'm going up to the Forest now, anyway."

"Okay. I'm going to, um, _prepare_ a bit for the arrival of Scamall. I think we can count on some surprise visits from the Nim over the next few days."

***

The announcement comes the next day. As soon as dusk falls, the sky lights up with a blue, flickering image, broadcast from Scamall. Everyone's to go to the town square in Glesting tomorrow evening, to watch the the arrival of Scamall on the Magitron screen. For three days, Scamall will be anchored on The Prairie, the vast grassland to the north of Freya's farm.

"Oh, lucky Freya. I'm sure she'll be over the moon to have Scamall as her new neighbour," says Arthur sarcastically to Morgana when they've come inside.

Morgana shrugs. "I don't know what she thinks of Scamall. She's never said anything."

"She's always helped us, though, even when she's been warned off by the Nim." 

"Yes, she has." Morgana looks at him and smiles. "So — do you want to go up on The Burh tomorrow night, after the Magitron thing? I want to see it with my own eyes."

***

Farmers and townspeople stand shoulder to shoulder in the Glesting town square, watching Scamall descend on The Prairie. It does look like a cloud, a bright cloud with hazy, white spires, glittering with a million lights. It's breathtaking, it's immense, covering all of the Prairie and spilling over into the northernmost part of Freya's lands. It shifts and shimmers in white, blue, and shades of pink, like snow at sunset. Once it's settled, a gate opens at the base of the cloud like a dark, gaping mouth, and a white staircase is lowered to the ground.

There's a collective intake of breath in the square, because maybe they'll get to see the High Priestess, but in the end nothing happens at all. No one comes. The staircase is empty and the gate stays open like an invitation. Or a threat.

When the screen goes dark, Arthur and Morgana follow the jostling crowd out of the square and along the streets. Outside the town gate they part from Uther, who heads home while they take the road past the North Field to climb The Burh. Even if it's late it's not entirely dark — the lights from Scamall light up the sky like the brightest of moons would, enough that they don’t need a torch.

In the Forest the going is more difficult — it's dark in there and the ground is uneven. Morgana creates a shining, blue sphere of magic to light their way.

"Those spirits and sighs and things that people talk about," says Arthur, "up by the Fire Oak. Have you ever heard or seen anything like that? Do you believe in it?"

"Nope." Morgana shakes her head. "I've never heard or seen a thing up there."

"Me neither." Arthur glances into the woods on either side of them, where the darkness is impenetrable. Above them is a strip of starry sky, like a celestial mirror image of their path. "But on a night like this, and in this light, it's easy to believe in stuff like that."

"Don't get spooked now, Arthur! I really want to see Scamall."

"I'm not spooked! I want to see it, too."

When they reach the top, they stop to look out to the north. Morgana extinguishes her blue sphere. The lights of Freya's farm look weak and muted next to the extravagant sparkle of Scamall.

"It looks like I imagined Queen Guinevere's jewellery," Morgana whispers, "when Leon told us those stories. I've never seen a diamond but this is what they must look like."

Arthur can't deny it's beautiful, but it's hard to appreciate the beauty of something that holds so many other associations and implications. Morgana glances up at him — he's taller than she is now — and slides her arm around his waist. When he puts his arm around her she leans her head against his shoulder and whispers: "I really hate them, you know."

Arthur starts. "The Nim?"

"The Nim. The Scamall people. All those indifferent magicians." She pauses a moment. "I admire what Aglain does, but we need more than that."

"More?"

"I don't think we should talk about it here. Not now, at least." She removes her arm from his waist. "I've seen enough. Let's go home."

On their way home, among the shadows in the Forest, Morgana says quietly: "One day, I hope someone will have the courage to bring Scamall down."


	6. Rope

The Beltane fires have been kindled and the flames leap high into the air, spitting sparks and licking at the darkening skies. The crowd moves; people take each other's hands and create a long chain. Singing and laughing, they run between the bonfires for good luck and protection.

Spring is officially here.

Arthur stands with Lance and a group of friends from school when Gwen comes up to them. In the warm, orange glow from the firelight she's so pretty Arthur's heart leaps into his throat. 

"I didn't see you before," he says, "when we decorated the May bush."

"No, Dad had work to finish and I waited for him. We had our own May bush at home." She smiles up at him.

"Psst, Arthur." Mithian nudges Arthur with an elbow and passes him a bottle of white liquor. He takes a swig, shuddering as it goes down, and offers the bottle to Gwen. 

She wrinkles her nose. "No, thanks."

Arthur doesn't particularly like it either and he doesn't enjoy being drunk, but stealthily sharing a bottle with his friends like this makes him feel grown up, and in any case there isn't enough to make them drunk.

He reaches across Gwen and passes the bottle to Lance. "Remember when we stole that white liquor from your dad when we were thirteen?"

Lance makes a face. "Ugh. Don't remind me."

"Not so bad that you won't drink now, though?" Arthur nods towards the bottle he's handing over.

Lance grins. "Bloody nearly." But he does take the bottle.

Gwen is looking from Arthur to Lance and back again. "What happened?" 

"Exactly what you'd expect. We ended up being sick behind the barn." Arthur laughs. "It wasn't pretty."

Something about Gwen always makes his heart pound. He's a bit in awe of her, has been ever since that swordfight in the barn, and as far as he's concerned she's in a league of her own. Arthur has kissed two girls, Mithian and Viv, but Mithian and Arthur only wanted to know what it was like and Viv is on a quest to kiss all the final-year boys. With Gwen it would be different. Arthur would _really_ like to kiss her, and not as an experiment. He'd like to kiss her because of who she is. A girl who can beat him in a swordfight.

When the bonfires are burning low, it's time for everyone to get their torches and return home.

"See you soon?" Arthur says to Gwen. He hadn't meant it to come out like a question.

She laughs. "I'll see you at school tomorrow. Is that soon enough?"

"I suppose it'll have to be," he says in a low voice. 

Gwen looks up at him. Her eyes are wide with the bonfires reflected in them as she slips her hand into his. Arthur's heartbeat is choking him.

When he leans down she doesn't back away. "See you then."

The kiss is soft and innocent, only lips touching lips. It feels right. It feels perfect.

Gwen seems to thinks so too, because when he straightens up and looks at her, she's radiant.

Arthur's feet barely touch the ground as they walk home. The others are talking around him - Morgana and Uther, Lance and Elaine - but he isn't listening. It's a beautiful night with stars in the sky and the smell of spring in the air. An owl hoots somewhere; a tawny. When they get home to Cavalon they'll rekindle the fire in their stove with the torch from the bonfire, and then spring is here for real.

Arthur can't wait for tomorrow.

***

"I'm moving out," Morgana announces at breakfast the next morning.

Arthur is so preoccupied with Gwen that Morgana's words fly straight past him. He nods distractedly, but a sharp movement from Uther shakes him awake and he realises what Morgana just said.

"Wait - what?" he blurts. "You're moving out? Where to?"

"Aglain has recruited a third liaison," Morgana says. "For the townspeople. They need a representative, too."

Arthur hasn't thought of that, but in many ways the townspeople are worse off than the farmers. Of course they need their own liaison. "Who? Is he any good?"

She shrugs. "Remains to be seen. He's nice enough, I suppose. We were at school together, at Micelenie. His name's Gilli. His parents died when he was very young and he grew up with a magicless aunt in Glesting."

"So what, are you moving in with him?"

Uther scowls at that, but Morgana laughs. "No! At least not in the way you mean. Scamall wants us - the liaisons - to stay in Strate, with the rest of the local Nim division. They want us all in one place."

Uther's fist falls against the table. "And you're going to comply with their wishes?"

"It's less of a wish and more of an order, Dad," says Morgana calmly. "And in any case I think it will be a good thing for you if you're separated from me. The Nim are suspicious of us, the liaisons I mean, and of the work we do. It might be good for you not to be so closely connected with me. You're my family and that's your bad luck, but this way you won't have to be part of… of anything I might do."

Arthur stops chewing. "What are you planning, Morgana?"

"Nothing," says Morgana lightly. "At least not yet."

"I don't like this." Uther gets up from the table. "I don't like it at all, but you're eighteen, you're of age, and I can't stop you." He pauses, clearing his throat. "I approve of your work, Morgana. I want you to know that. Aglain has done a lot of good. He's a good man with wild ideas, and sometimes that's needed. But it's dangerous." He skims a calloused hand over his daughter's hair. "You're in a difficult position, with pressure from Scamall and the Nim on one side and from local, magicless people on the other. Your work is important but I want you to be careful."

This is a long speech for Uther and he looks embarrassed at his own wordiness. Morgana gets up and hugs him.

"Thank you, Dad," she whispers. 

"Hm. Yes. Well. When are you leaving?"

"Next week."

Uther nods. Apparently there's been enough sentimentality for one day. "I'm going over to Joyous Gard," he says.

Arthur stays at the table although he should be leaving for school. He keeps turning his beaker round this way and that, watching the dregs make patterns at the bottom. Cavalon wasn't the same when Morgana was at Micelenie. The house felt empty and it will be the same now. At least then they'd known she was safe. Now she's moving into the lion's den.

As if she can read his thoughts, she smiles at him. "Get to know your enemy." She reaches over and gives him a little shove. "Don't brood, Arthur. It'll be fine. Aglain is on our side, you know that."

"I know. But you'll be surrounded by Nim, and what about Gilli? Is he on our side?"

Morgana bites her lip, looking down at her hands. "To be honest, I'm not sure about him." Then she looks up, smiling. "But he has a bit of a crush on me, so I don't think he'll do anything that would harm me in any way. Not if he can help it." 

"Maybe he can't," Arthur mutters. 

"Well, then that's how it is."

"Be careful, anyway, Morgana. Promise."

"I promise." The way she looks at him tells him she's giving him their old promise as well - that they'll always look out for each other.

***

School is over for good for Lance and Arthur, and they have a small celebration at Joyous Gard. Morgana is there with Aglain, Gaius has come from the village and Leon has just arrived, but Arthur only sees Gwen, who is there with her dad. They smile at each other across the table like they know a secret no one else does.

This is going to be a great summer.

***

Arthur's had a good day in Glesting. The vegetables, metal scraps and dried herbs and mushrooms he brought to the covered market this morning bought him a small solar-battery torch, a bottle of rapeseed oil, some salt, and two spools of sewing thread. He's humming to himself as he walks towards the town gate. He's in no hurry to go home and wonders whether he should roam a bit, maybe go to the north wall where there might be an impromptu art exhibition - there is sometimes, even if the site is periodically raided by the Nim. Perhaps he could have something to drink at the Caerleon Café. He still has some herbs at the bottom of his haversack that could buy him an iced mint tea.

As Arthur crosses Fortunate Isle Street that leads to the center of town, he realises something is happening in the square. A crowd is gathering and a booming voice carries down the street. It's impossible to distinguish any words but it sounds nothing like the usual official announcements and there's no Magitron in the sky.

He runs to the square, weaving through the crowd to get a view. The atmosphere is tense, as if everyone is collectively holding their breath. Arthur's stomach feels hollow. What is going on?

There's someone up on the dais, which is only used by the Nim for public announcements… Arthur draws a breath.

Aglain's arms are spread wide and his eyes are ablaze. "We need unity, not division! We need freedom, not oppression! We need to share fairly, not fight each other for scraps!"

Arthur isn't the only one who gasps. People are jostling and murmuring, glancing furtively around them to see how others react. Some are half turned away from the dais, torn between the desire to stay and listen to this crazy person on a suicide mission and the need to run before the Nim arrive.

Arthur's heart beats in his throat and his fingertips tingle. It's the first time he's ever heard anyone speak like this, fearlessly, in public. People have murmured and muttered their protests, but never openly. This is like a fresh gust of wind over stagnant marshlands.

"We are resourceful," Aglain is saying, "and we should use our resources wisely. You have heard the accusations from magicians all your life, all of you - how magicless people misused the land. They misused the land, they exploited and misused its resources, they did not value what the land gave them. They squandered the riches of the earth and brought about the Disasters."

Arthur chews at his lip, glancing at the tense faces around him. No one seems to know what to think or how to behave. A few are laughing as if Aglain is being ridiculous, but mostly they're just stunned. They know it's madness, what Aglain is doing. What is he thinking?

It's insane, there's no doubt about that, but it's also the most exciting thing Arthur has ever seen or heard. His heart is pounding so hard he's shaking with it. His face is hot and he can barely stand still. Why isn't there more of a reaction? What is wrong with people?

Aglain's voice booms over the square. "Is this not exactly what the magicians are doing now? Is this not exactly what is happening again? And this time, they have no one to blame but themselves."

Every word of it is true. This is what they're being taught at school - the misused resources, the need for a new order where magicians take their rightful place. Magic is nobler than technology. The magicless must serve the magicians. Hierarchies and enslavement. These things have been taught as truths. Now here's Aglain questioning it all, taking the magicians' rhetoric and throwing it back in their faces.

Arthur's aware that there are magicians who oppose the system. Freya, who goes out of her way to help her magicless neighbours. Alvarr, who pretends not to see the eggs in the chicken coop on his collection round. But their rebellion is private and small and they're doing it from within the system, within its framework, never attacking the system itself. This is on a different scale altogether. This is the kind of thing that puts magicians in power plants.

Why haven't the Nim turned up yet?

"What do you think you're doing then, mate? Who do you think you are? Come to save us all?" someone shouts from the back.

There are a few laughs here and there, mostly from relief that someone's broken the tension.

Aglain shades his eyes with his hand, taking it in good humour. "No, I'm saying we can save ourselves! We need to share the work _and_ the rewards. A few profiting from the hard work of many - that should be a thing of the past. That mistake was made by the magicless once, in many shapes and forms, through many periods in history. We should have evolved. We _have_ evolved. We should be wiser. We _are_ wiser."

There's a ripple of cautious cheering and scattered applause, but most are still just gaping.

"There's no need for hunger if we only learn to share!"

Arthur balls his hands into fists. His face is burning. It's finally happening, the very thing he's been dreaming about. If this is a general sentiment among magicians and magicless alike, if there can be a movement with Aglain as its spearhead, then Arthur will be the first to join.

Freedom and equality. Food for everyone. That's worth fighting for.

Aglain is launching into a speech about how everyone should unite, peacefully, starting with demonstrations and public meetings right here in the square, when Morgana appears by his side on the dais. Something, a word, a shout, catches in Arthur's throat. He's not sure if it's _yes_ or _no_ \- he wants to run up to Morgana and pull her down from the dais, away from danger, but he equally wants to raise her hand in the air and cheer her on.

Before he can do either, the Nim arrive. Four of them.

They storm the dais, two from either side, and Aglain's speech is cut off abruptly - they've taken his voice. Morgana tries something, a spell, a hex, but nothing happens. The Nim soldiers laugh.

 _Your magic was taken away from you, or blocked, so you couldn't defend yourself. Then you were beaten,_ Morgana had said about punishment at school. That's what the Nim are doing now, right in front of the crowd.

Two Nim soldiers are holding Aglain's arms and Morgana throws herself at one of them, beating at him with her fists. Another Nim pulls her off and slaps her across the face so hard she staggers backwards.

Before Arthur even knows what he's doing, he flings off his haversack and runs up the steps to the dais, his fist connecting with the Nim soldier's jaw. Pain shoots up his arm but oh, it feels good to punch a Nim in the face. He's wanted to do that all his life.

Morgana covers her cheek with one hand and frantically waves him off with the other. Her eyes are wide and she is shaking her head. _Leave, leave!_

As if he'd leave without her. 

"Always," he mouths, and her eyes fill with tears.

"This is the brother," says one of the Nim soldiers to the others. "Another Pendragon. I'll take care of him."

Out of the corner of his eye Arthur glimpses a rope in the soldier's hand. At the soldier's command the rope whips around Arthur's ankles, coiling around them, yanking him up in the air. He's an inch from hitting his head on the edge of the dais, and then he's strung up in a tree by the side of the dais, upside down. His newly bought torch falls out of his pocket, clatters to the ground and breaks on the cobblestones.

The crowd has begun to disperse but the Nim soldiers stop them. "Nobody leaves! You're staying to watch what happens if you threaten the peace."

Blood rushes to Arthur's head, pounding and thudding in his ears. The world is upside down and frightening. He sees Morgana try to run up to him but once again she's pulled back by the Nim. One of them blasts her with magic and she crumples to the floor.

"Take her away," he says dismissively, as if he's lost interest.

Two more Nim soldiers arrive. They lift her up and she hangs lifeless between them, her head dangling.

Arthur yells. He can't get any words out.

"Watch carefully, Pendragon," one of the Nim soldiers says, grotesquely upside down in front of him. "You'll realise how lucky you are."

More helpless than he's ever felt in his life, Arthur watches them take Aglain to the tree on the other side of the dais, raise his arms above his head and nail his hands to the tree trunk. 

Before they do, they give him his voice back. He screams as the nails enter his flesh.

The whole world echoes with the sound of hammering and with Aglain's screams. The crowd is silent until someone begins to sob. Arthur closes his eyes and focuses on not being sick.

"Your turn, Pendragon," says one of the Nim, and Arthur opens his eyes. He wonders vaguely if he's going to die but it doesn't frighten him. He feels numb by what he's just seen, and weirdly distant, as if this is happening to someone else.

"This one defended a traitor!" the Nim soldier shouts to the crowd.

He whispers something and Arthur's shirt falls off, landing in a heap beneath his head. One of the Nim brings a whip.

"Scamall is not vindictive," he calls. "You're witnessing our dedication to peace and justice. We will show this young man mercy. He was only trying to protect his family, but his sister was a traitor. His loyalty saved him but he will pay for his stupidity."

The first lash of the whip cuts across Arthur's back with a stinging, searing pain. He groans, bites his tongue and feels blood in his mouth. The Nim soldiers cheer. Another lash, and another; the Nim cheering for each one. Arthur's head pounds, his vision swims, everything is drowning in red-hot pain. When the fourth lash cuts his back, he screams. He's still screaming at the fifth.

The Nim soldier lowers the whip and turns to the crowd. "Today, you have all witnessed the mercy of Scamall! Do not forget!"

Laughing and slapping each other's shoulders, the soldiers leave the dais. As they walk past Aglain, one of them hisses a string of harsh words, and Aglain hangs quietly with blood running down his arms. 

Arthur must be bleeding, too. His hair is damp with sweat but the stuff dripping down on his shirt on the paving isn't sweat. It's a dark, deep red colour that soaks into the faded, dustier red of his tunic. His back is on fire, his head aches and his hands feel swollen. There's a metallic taste in his mouth. How long can you hang like this before you die?

The crowd is dispersing quickly until there are only two people left in the square: one nailed to a tree and one strung up by his feet. Flies begin to buzz around them.

From far away, Arthur hears himself groan.

***

When Arthur comes to, it's at the sound of Leon's voice. "Here, Gwaine! I'll catch him if you cut the rope."

Leon's tall, broad frame fills Arthur's field of vision and tears of relief spring to his smarting eyes.

"Wait!" It's Freya. Her running steps approach across the square. "Wait, let me. Hold his head, Leon. I'll let my magic catch him. We can't let him fall on his back."

Knowing he's in good hands, Arthur passes out again.

***

The next time Arthur comes to, the world is the right way up. He's sitting at the edge of the dais with Leon propping him up. His head throbs so badly he leans over and throws up.

"I'm glad you had the presence of mind to lean away from me," says Leon, laughing. "Hello. It's good to have you back." 

Arthur makes a face, wiping at his mouth with the back of his hand. Freya hands him a mug of water and he takes it gratefully, rinses his mouth and drinks the rest.

"We're taking you to Gaius," Leon says. "We'll sit here for a bit first, until you can stand up."

Arthur shudders. The sun is beating down but he feels icy cold.

"I put a freezing charm on your back," says Freya. "For the pain."

"Thank you." His tongue feels too large for his mouth. "Ugh."

"Are you going to be sick again?"

"I don't think so. I'll try to stand up now."

The world spins when he does, but Leon has him safely by the arm. On his other side, another man appears.

"This is Gwaine," Leon says. "A fellow wanderer who's here to find work. I guess you just got him some, but not quite the kind we'd expected."

Gwaine grins. "I'm not picky." 

Even in Arthur's foggy state, he can see that Gwaine is incredibly good-looking.

His head is clearing now. "Morgana! Has anyone seen Morgana? They took her away."

"Morgana was here?" Freya sounds worried.

"They blasted her with magic - I think they took hers - and two of the Nim carried her away."

Freya looks grim. "Okay. I'll try to find out where she is."

"Go if you need to, Freya," Leon says. "We'll take Arthur to Gaius now."

"Aglain." There's a lump in Arthur's throat. "Is he dead?"

The look on Leon's face tells him the answer even before Leon nods.

"They killed him when they left," Arthur whispers. "They just walked past him and one of them said something. He didn't move after that."

"It was better that way," says Leon quietly. "It could have taken him days to die, hanging like that. I suppose they didn't want to risk anyone saving him, so they killed him."

A wave of nausea hits Arthur but recedes before he's actually sick. He's grateful for Freya's freezing charm. His head hurts so badly he doesn't even want to think about his back.

"Come," says Leon gently. "Let's get you to Gaius."

***

"They've put guards at the town gates," Gwaine says.

They're sitting by the drystone wall looking out over the fields, where the setting sun gives the ripening wheat a warm, golden hue. It's time for harvest soon.

"No one gets in or out without Nim approval, and when you go through the gate they put a tracking spell on you so they know where you are at all times."

Arthur stretches, grimacing. His back has healed well but he still moves and walks a little stiffly.

"So that's the Aglain effect," he says. "Guards at the gate. More rules." Out here, with Leon and Gwaine, he dares follow up on that thought. "I wonder if that's the only effect of his speech. When I listened to him in the square that day, I was so excited. I thought he'd, you know, shake people awake. I thought we could finally bring about some change. Have a go at it, at least."

Gwaine leans back with his hands clasped behind his head, a stalk of wheat hanging from from the corner of his mouth. "You never know. I don't think people will forget. A seed sown."

"I just hope they remember what Aglain said, not only what happened after."

"Any news about Morgana?" Leon asks.

Arthur shakes his head, yanks off a blade of grass and shreds it. "Nothing."

Of everything that happened that day in the square, this is the worst: that he couldn't protect Morgana. All their lives they've promised to look out for each other, but when Morgana really needed Arthur's help there was nothing he could do.

***

There's a new Nim collector doing the rounds, one of the Nim who were on the dais that day. His name is Mordred. He's young and handsome with a hard look in his eye and a curl of his lip that makes Arthur dread his visits.

But if anyone knows anything about Morgana, Mordred should.

"I beg you," Uther says. "Tell me what happened to my daughter."

There's a strange look on Mordred's face, part triumph and part contempt. "Even a peasant like you must have realised by now that she's dead."

For a moment Arthur thinks Uther is going to hit Mordred, but after the first, brief flash of temper he only covers his face with his hands. "Oh, no. Please, no."

Arthur puts an arm around his father's shouders. They're of a height now.

"Are you absolutely sure?" he asks Mordred, who scoffs.

"Of course I'm sure."

"We should be allowed to bury her, then," Uther says into his hands. "You must let us have her back so we can bury her."

Mordred adjusts his cloak, brushing off invisible lint. "She's been buried already."

Uther looks up. His eyes are red. "Where? Where is she? We'd like to visit her grave. _Please_ let us visit her grave."

"You can't," says Mordred, smirking. "You really don't know much, do you? She had magic, so she's buried in the magician's graveyard on the other side of Strate. Magicless visitors aren't allowed."

It takes all of Arthur's self-restraint not to punch Mordred in the face.

When Mordred leaves, he leans close to Arthur's ear and murmurs: "We have our eyes on you, Pendragon."


	7. Harness

The ceremony in the graveyard is short and matter-of-fact. Arthur stands stiffly with his hands clasped in front of him, not looking at the dark rectangle of the open grave by his feet. Uther worked the earth all his life and now he's been returned to it. Arthur's eyes are dry, but if anyone finds him cold-hearted, he doesn't care. He prefers to do his crying in private.

Besides, there are few people attending, and those who are here know him well. Lance. Leon. Freya. Gaius. Tom and Gwen. They can see beyond his stony face and tearless eyes.

When the ceremony is over they file past him, shaking his hand, patting his shoulder, murmuring their condolences. Gwen hugs him. So does Gaius.

When they have left, Arthur turns away from the open grave and walks up to the low stone wall surrounding the graveyard. This is it, then. He's eighteen years old and alone in the world. There's no one else left.

He straightens his back and takes a deep breath, looking out over the fields. It's a grey day but he still needs to shade his eyes. To the southwest is Lake Farm, Freya's place at the foot of The Burh. She offered him a bed for the night if he didn't want to be alone, but Arthur needs to be in his own house.

He walks back to Cavalon across the bare fields that are his responsibility now, and lets himself into the empty kitchen. The house looks unlived in, as if no one's been there for weeks. This is what Arthur's life will be like from now on. Dark, cold, empty.

***

Arthur keeps getting up every morning to do his work, because he has no choice. Every task, every movement feels automatic, mechanical, as if he isn't really there. He feeds the chickens, sees to the hydroponics and makes occasional visits to the Forest to collect firewood. He doesn't go up on The Burh. It feels like he'll see too much from up there, things that make him restless and impatient. Unsettling things. Most of all, he'd like to lie face down on his bed and not get up for a month.

Even in the weeks that Uther was ill and declining rapidly, he could still give advice. Now there's no one to ask and Arthur feels utterly alone. Everything must come from him now - ideas, decisions, manual labour. It can be done, of course. Lance has run Joyous Gard on his own for two years already, ever since Elaine died, but that's a smaller farm than Cavalon. Freya manages her aquaponics farm on her own as well, but she has her magic to help her. Leon has been a great help but he's left to go who knows where. The responsibility weighs Arthur down.

In the evenings, he rattles around his empty kitchen like a lost marble. He keeps himself busy mending tools and the horse's harness as best he can, and eats his meals alone.

Washing his bowl after supper, he stops and stares down at the dirty dishwater without seeing it. He remembers Gaius saying at the funeral: _If there's anything I can do, anything at all, just ask. I'll be happy to help in any way I can._

Arthur knows he meant it, too. It wasn't just an empty phrase.

He stands by the kitchen window biting the inside of his lip as he watches the chickens strut and peck in the yard. Then his eyes wander to the neglected herb patch, and an idea begins to take shape.

***

Arthur has been to Glesting a hundred times after the magic fence was erected, but he's still not used to the way the old town wall seems to wobble and shiver with magic, like it's covered by a layer of jelly. The bored Nim guard notes Arthur's name and destination, places a tracking charm on him and steps aside to let him through.

"You know the rules," she says, stifling a yawn. "Take the shortest route. Be back before sundown or you'll be fined."

Arthur only nods. He does know. Fined if he's lucky, worse if he's not.

As he crosses the square he can't hold back a shudder, unable to stop the memories flashing through his mind. Knotted ropes. His red shirt on the ground. The world turned upside down, blood pounding in his head, the sickening sound of nails hammered through flesh. For a moment he thinks he can still hear it like a ghostly, whispering echo off the cobblestones, but it's only imagination, just like the sting of his back is imagination. The whip marks are long since healed and scarred over, and Aglain is dead and can't feel the nails through his palms.

When Arthur walks up to the draughty, ramshackle house and knocks on the door, it opens a fraction and Gaius peers out, brightening when he sees who it is.

"Arthur! Come in, my boy. I hope you're not ill? You haven't hurt yourself?"

His questions make Arthur ashamed of himself. He should visit Gaius more often, social visits, not only when he needs something. Even today there's something he needs, but he hopes that what he has to say will make up for that at least a little.

"No, nothing like that, Gaius. I just wanted to talk to you."

The kitchen is warm from the fire in the stove and Gaius puts on another log, but it doesn't escape Arthur that the wood supply is running low. That provides him with another good argument for his suggestion.

Gaius makes a mint infusion and they sit facing each other across the table. Arthur takes a breath. He wants to tell Gaius how empty the house feels and how lonely he is, but he's eighteen years old and a farmer running his own place, not a needy child, so he cuts to the chase.

"I've had plenty of time to think since Dad's funeral, Gaius. There's only me at the farm now and it seems such a waste for me to have all that space just to myself."

Arthur looks around the tiny, draughty kitchen where light seeps in through the cracks where the boards don't quite meet. He decides not to mention that, nor the meagre food rations in the village or Gaius' failing wood supply, but focus on his own reasons. No one likes to be at the receiving end of charity.

"Gaius, I was wondering if you'd like to come and live at the farm. It doesn't make sense that we have two households, two houses to heat. We'd do better together. We could benefit from each other's work, I think. And we'd both have company."

He pauses to gauge Gaius's reaction. The old man looks baffled as if this has never occurred to him.

"I realise that your business could suffer if you move outside the fence," Arthur adds quickly, "but Cavalon isn't too far from town, so people could still come and buy their remedies from you, couldn't they? And there's Mum's herb patch that you could use, and…"

Gaius reaches across the table to pat Arthur's hand. His eyes are moist.

"You're a good lad, Arthur. You're kind; you always were. Believe me when I say I'm deeply grateful for your offer. Of course I'd be more than happy to move to the farm, but..." Gaius pauses and scrutinises Arthur's face. "Are you sure that's what you want? It's only been a few weeks since your father died, and even if you feel lonely now, one day in the not too distant future, you will marry. And then you'll want me out of the house."

Arthur blinks. This is an unexpected argument and he's completely unprepared for it, stumbling through a rapid succession of emotions: relief that Gaius isn't averse to moving in, unease at the mention of marriage, and a stab of anger that Gaius thinks Arthur would selfishly throw him out.

"I'm only eighteen," he says, his voice hard. "I'm not likely to get married for a good while yet, and the house is big enough for you to stay even if I do."

Gaius's face softens. "I didn't mean to offend you, Arthur. I was only pointing out something you might not have thought of. If you think it's a good idea for me to move to the farm, then I will, with gratitude and pleasure. But I hope you realise I'm no farmer. I might not be of much help to you."

Arthur feels his whole body relax. He hadn't realised how tense he was until now. He gives Gaius a grin. "Well, you know how to keep bees, for a start. We've never had beehives at Cavalon before but I'd like to have them. I was thinking you could take care of the chickens, and maybe you could do something with the kitchen garden? I know you have a green thumb. And then there's Mum's old herb patch, like I said. It's been neglected forever, but you could use it, couldn't you?"

Gaius nods slowly, a smile spreading over his face. "I'd like that. If I move to the farm, I'd like to be useful. I love gardening and I think I'm up to the task of feeding chickens."

Arthur's own smile broadens. He hasn't felt this hopeful in a long time. "When would be a good time for you to move in?"

"Give me a week or two gather my things together and notify the Nim. I'll be there well before Beltane."

"Good. That's settled, then."

They smile at each other.

Gaius places both his palms on the table. "I think this calls for a small celebration."

He gets up and reaches into a cupboard for a bottle of white liquor, probably stashed away for medical purposes or for emergencies of one kind or another. Uther had a bottle like that, too. It's still there. Arthur has opened the cupboard more than once but always closed it again. Getting drunk won't change anything.

They clink glasses and swallow the burning liquid, repressing a shiver as it goes down. Arthur manages not to cough.

"Thank you," says Gaius warmly, "for your kindness to an old man."

"You're giving me too much credit. I'm afraid it's not only kindness." Arthur can admit this now. "It's for myself as well. I'll be very glad of your company."

There's a different guard at the gate this time, one that Arthur knows.

"Have you changed jobs?" he asks. "The Nim must be short of people if they have collectors manning the gate."

Alvarr smiles, shaking his head as he removes the tracking spell. "No, just doing a friend a favour. How are the crops coming on?"

"A bit early in the season to say," Arthur says, shifting his shoulders as if there are ants down his shirt. Having the spell placed or lifted always makes his skin crawl. "But it's looking good so far."

"Right, then. You're all set. I'll see you on my rounds next week."

Arthur gives him a nod as he leaves. Dusk falls before he reaches the farm, but his steps are light.

***

Asking Gaius to move in was a good decision. He sets up his beehives and does things Arthur rarely has time for, like sweeping floors and airing bedclothes. Soon the kitchen garden and herb patch are in order and Cavalon begins to feel like a real home again, not just a roof over their heads.

Gaius has been at Cavalon for two months when he pushes his plate aside after their evening meal and clasps his hands on the table in front of him. "Arthur, there's something I'd like to ask you."

Arthur swallows the last of his soup. It was good today, made with chicken scraps, onions and herbs. "Yes?"

He rubs his eyes and yawns. It's been a long day.

"I had a letter yesterday."

"A letter?" That's unusual. Arthur hasn't seen many letters in his life and has never had one, unless he counts the one his parents received about him starting school.

"From Hunith, my niece. She lives in Welle, but her landlady is getting married and is kicking her out. She asks if I can help. No, she _begs_ me to."

Arthur gets up and puts their bowls in the sink. "So you're wondering if she can come here?"

"I hate to ask you for anything, Arthur," Gaius says. "It's good of you to have me. It's a relief to be out of town and my life has improved so much."

Smiling, Arthur turns around at the sink. "It's not charity, you know. You're a real help to me. But why did I never know you had a brother? Or was it a sister?"

"A brother. He died when Hunith was quite young. We could do much worse than having Hunith here, Arthur. She's a good girl, sensible and kind, and a hard worker. I promise you she'll earn her keep."

"Another pair of hands wouldn't go amiss," Arthur says. "Does she cook?"

Gaius laughs. "She's an excellent cook. We could do with some help on that front."

Arthur is an indifferent cook at best and Gaius is abysmal. 

"Well, that settles it as far as I'm concerned," Arthur says. "You can write to your niece and tell her she'll be welcome."

***

The "girl" turns out to be around Arthur's mother's age, but other than that, Gaius isn't wrong about her.

"I can't tell you how grateful I am," says Hunith earnestly to Arthur. "I know I'm another mouth to feed but I promise I'll do everything I can to help with the farm. I have something of a green thumb, if I say so myself."

She sets to work immediately, pruning the fruit trees in the orchard and weeding out the overgrown part of the kitchen garden that proved too much for Gaius. She takes over the running of the hydroponics house, and under her care it begins to yield more than ever. Just like Gaius promised, she's a good cook, and has a knack for hiding food from the collectors.

Arthur is glad she came to stay. When they gather around the table in the evenings it feels almost - _almost_ \- like having a family again.

***

After two years together, Arthur breaks up with Gwen - or she breaks up with him, he's not entirely sure. It's not dramatic in the least; it just wasn't right for either of them and they both know it. Part of Arthur is disappointed. He knows she'd make a good wife and he could be, if not happy so at least content with her, but he wants more. Somehow he's never been able to picture the two of them settled at Cavalon, retiring to their bedroom in the evenings... He can't define it even to himself. He just knows there should be _more_ to a relationship than this.

When he thinks about it, he knows he's never been in love in his life, with Gwen or with anyone. All his infatuations at school were boys. Maybe there will never be a wife at Cavalon, but a partner instead.

That thought makes him feel better. This is something he can picture more easily - the future Cavalon Farm where Arthur lives with a partner. Gaius is there, too; and Hunith. Even a husband of Hunith's if she ever decides to marry. The thought excites him for five minutes before his conscience catches up with him, because what kind of person looks forward to something else, someone else, when he's just broken up with his girlfriend?

***

On a clear autumn day, Arthur takes Amelia to the North Field to get it ready for winter.

"Here we are. Are you all set for work?" he asks her, and she turns her head and puts her nose in his hand. He laughs, patting her neck. "You're a good girl. Walk on, then. Walk on."

Halfway through the first furrow she stumbles, but Arthur doesn't realise anything is wrong with her until they've almost reached the edge of the field. She stumbles again and takes a few more steps before her forelegs fold and she tilts alarmingly to one side.

Arthur drops the reins. "Amelia!"

He runs up to her head, strokes her nose and calls her name, but her eyes are half closed and she doesn't respond to his voice. When he realises how painfully awkward her position is, he removes her harness and pulls the plough away. Once there's nothing in the way, Amelia collapses onto her side. There's an ache in Arthur's chest, in his throat.

"Oh, no," he whispers. "Amelia, please. Please don't."

She's breathing fast, her flank heaving. Arthur swallows tears and looks around frantically, wondering what to do, what he can possibly do. There's a terrible sound from Amelia, half groan and half sigh, and just at that moment, Freya emerges from the Forest at the top of the field. Relief makes Arthur's tears begin to flow.

There's no use trying to hide them, but he quickly wipes at his eyes and face as he calls: "Freya! I need help!"

She comes running towards him. "What is it, Arthur? Are you hurt?"

"It's not me, it's Amelia. Oh, god. Help me, Freya. Please."

Freya crouches down and strokes a gentle hand along Amelia's neck, looking up at Arthur and shaking her head. "There isn't much we can do for her, except make it as painless as possible."

"I can't do it, Freya," Arthur whispers. "I can't kill her." He sounds pitiful, not like a hardened farmer at all. "I don't want her to suffer but I can't do it."

His voice breaks on a sob. Amelia's eyes are closed now and her breathing is shallow.

"I'll take care of it," Freya says.

She puts an arm around Arthur's waist and turns him towards the drystone wall, towards the Forest.

"Don't look." Her voice is gentle. "I promise she won't feel a thing. It will be just like falling asleep."

Arthur nods, throat aching. He can't stand it, he can't stand it, he must leave... Halfway to the edge of the Forest he turns around. Freya is on her knees with Amelia's head in her lap, stroking her nose. When Freya begins to sing Arthur breaks into a run and doesn't stop until he's well into the Forest, deep under the trees. He sits among the withered ferns with his face in his hands, wondering why he's being so stupid. He's a farmer, he should be indifferent to things like this. Farm animals are there to provide food one way or another. He shouldn't allow himself to get so attached to them.

But Amelia is a horse, and it's different with a horse. She's been his companion on long working days. His friend. And it's not only that - without a horse he'll lose his livelihood. How will he ever be able to get a new horse? Even if he sells the meat, it won't be enough to pay for one.

He stands up and waits until Freya calls his name.

"There you are," she says as he walks towards her. "It's over now." She gives him a quick hug. "Don't worry about anything, Arthur. I'll help you. I can take her away with me now, if you want me to, and I'll help you sell the meat and find a new horse. Do you want me to do that?"

Arthur clears his throat, determinedly not looking at Amelia at their feet. "Thank you, Freya. Yes. Please." He wipes his eyes. "Oh, god. I'm sorry."

"You loved your work horse," Freya says. "Your companion. There's nothing to apologise for. I'll help you get a new horse as soon as I can. If Lance is willing to pitch in, too, I'm sure we can work something out."

Arthur gathers up Amelia's harness and walks home numbly, trying not to think of her lying on her side like that. Determinedly thinking about Freya instead.

Because Freya is a mystery. Arthur has never really understood her. She's helped them so many times in so many ways, literally saving their lives, but he's never understood her motives. Neighbours help each other out, but she's gone well above and beyond what anyone could ever expect even from the kindest of neighbours. He once thought about her kindness as her own, quiet protest against the rule of Scamall, but now he's not sure.

She's the only farmer with magic he's ever heard of. She runs her aquaponics farm expertly, but why choose the hard life of a farmer when she doesn't have to? She could have led a completely different kind of life in Strate or some other magician's town, in Scamall even.

The Nim always talk to her and about her with great respect, and Arthur remembers Aglain saying that her magic is powerful. He referred to her as an "Ancient One". Arthur didn't know what that meant and still doesn't. Alvarr has hinted that Freya can do more or less whatever she wants and the Nim have orders not to interfere with her no matter what, but that doesn't seem to be quite true. She's been denied medicine on several occasions that Arthur knows of - when someone's been ill at Cavalon or Joyous Gard, because they knew she'd give it to her neighbours.

And there's this great sadness about her. He's never articulated it to himself before, but that's what it is: a deep sadness. She's unfailingly kind but even though he's known her all his life, he's never once seen her smile.

And now she's helping him find a new horse.

Arthur decides to go over to Joyous Gard in the evening and ask whether Lance would like to be part owner of a horse. He's had the use of Amelia now and then, when needed and when she could be spared, but it would make sense to share the cost and responsibility of a horse between the farms.

Arthur's eyes burn as he cleans the harness and hangs it on its hook, standing there looking at it and thinking of Amelia, thanking her quietly for her many, many years of hard work.

"Arthur? Is that you?" Hunith calls from the yard.

He takes a deep breath. "Yes, it's me. I have some sad news."


	8. White Mice

True to habit, Arthur wakes up at the break of dawn. He turns towards the window and looks at the pearly sky. It's going to be a beautiful day.

He needs to get up soon but allows himself five more minutes, trying to remember what he dreamt. Something vague and menacing with mist over marshlands, birds crying overhead… and the graveyard where Uther's grave was still an oblong of soft, dark dirt.

Arthur sits up in bed, rubbing at his face. It must be because he visited the grave yesterday. It's been covered with soft, green grass for years now. The small, simple wooden cross only has his parents' names on it, not even a date or a year. In front of it, flat in the grass, is the triangular piece of stone Arthur found in the North Field after Ygraine had died. Every time he visits the grave he kneels in the grass and touches it, follows the border of roses and the outline of the crown with his fingers and remembers how it made him feel like he should hold his breath. Now it makes him think of the long winter evenings of his childhood, when the solar batteries had run out and they weren't allowed to use the magic mains, when his parents lit beeswax candles and Leon told them stories of kings and queens and swords. Dangerous stories still. Forbidden ones still.

Arthur throws off the quilt and sets his feet on the floor, rubbing his toes along the wood. He's sore from all the heavy lifting he did yesterday, loading and unloading sacks of seeds and grain. It's strange that he should ache everywhere - after all, he does his fair share of lifting most days. Hay bales, buckets of chicken feed, watering cans, farm machinery... Maybe he used a different set of muscles yesterday. 

He stretches, yawns, and freezes mid-stretch as his eyes catch movement in the far corner of the room. Like a tiny patch of light.

It's a white mouse.

Mice in the house is very bad news, but something about the tiny creature makes Arthur stay motionless on the bed, only watching it as it comes closer. Slowly, with some little detours to sniff at things, it comes right up to his foot. He leans down and picks it up. It doesn't seem afraid at all, just sits in his palm looking at him with black, beady eyes, its pink nose quivering. The paws are pink too with pinpoint claws; the fur is velvety and perfectly white. 

Another white mouse appears from underneath the bed and Arthur picks that one up, too. He leans down and peers under the bed, looks around the room, but there are no more mice to be seen.

They're warm against him as he holds them to his chest and carries them downstairs, out on the steps. He should kill them, he knows that, but he can't bring himself to do it. Where is the idiot cat? It's supposed to do this kind of stuff for him. 

Arthur holds the mice up in front of his face in his cupped hands, amazed that they're just sitting there comfortably, not trying to escape.

"You're not going to eat my grain stores, are you," he says slowly.

They're _mice_ , of course they'll eat his grain stores - but somehow he doesn't believe they will.

He rounds the corner of the house, walks through the orchard where the dew makes his feet damp, and puts the little creatures down at the edge of the meadows. Frowning, he watches them disappear into the tall grass.

In the kitchen a bit later, when he has washed and dressed, he stands by the stove waiting for his pot of water to boil. Hunith has left a coil of apple peel and a few small, new leaves of mint and lemon balm on a saucer for his morning tea. On a plate is a slice of bread that looks a bit stale, a small wedge of goat's cheese, two dried apricots and half of the peeled apple. Next to the plate is a jar of golden honey. Arthur drops the herbs and apple peel into a beaker and pours the boiling water over them.

Just as he sits down to eat his breakfast, the kitchen door is flung open and Hunith comes rushing in with a smile on her face, holding out her cupped hands for him to see. For a fraction of a second he thinks she is holding the white mice before he realises it's two beautiful, perfectly shaped white eggs.

"Look!" Her eyes are radiant. "The hens have started laying again! And collection day was yesterday."

Her grin is triumphant and Arthur grins back. If the collectors were here yesterday it'll be a week until their next visit, which means four or five days when the eggs can be eaten or stashed away and no one will know. When the collectors return, Hunith can innocently claim that the hens didn't start laying until the day before. Or two days before, to be on the safe side.

"We're lucky this is Alvarr's month," she says. "He doesn't make surprise visits. He comes when he's supposed to, unlike that Kara - she's a nasty piece of work. Alvarr understands that we need to eat to be able to work."

Arthur nods. Kara is new, and even if he hates to admit it, she frightens him. She's suspicious and snide and sees too much; she's like a thunderstorm waiting to break. They all watch their mouths and their every move when she's around, and Arthur keeps expecting her to report them for something, real or fabricated. So far it hasn't happened but he _knows_ she's trouble.

Hunith places the eggs carefully in a bowl. "It's baking day, too. We'll have a good meal tonight."

The worst time of the year is over, the time when the winter larder has been emptied and the garden has yet to yield anything at all. Now there are at least nettles and ground elder and a few early herbs to be found, and even if that's not very filling, at least it makes a soup. But winters aren't as bad as they used to be before the hydroponics house was built. The collectors take most of the yield in winter, but a few leaves here and a root there is better than nothing. _Thank you, Aglain._

Arthur watches Hunith start her dough while he eats his breakfast. Thank goodness they still have some flour left.

He rises to rinse his mug and plate in the sink. "I'm looking forward to tonight, then. I'll be out in the fields today, to see if they're ready for tilling. I might go over to see Lance for a bit, too, to try and work out a schedule."

"Is Leon coming to help this year?"

Arthur nods. "He should be here in a day or two." 

Gaius comes in with an armful of firewood and almost trips over the cat, that shoots past him through the door like an arrow and begins to make figure eights around Hunith's legs. Arthur frowns and points an accusing finger at it.

"You! You're supposed to be pulling your weight around here like everyone else. I shouldn't have to find mice in my room when I wake up."

The cat blithely ignores him but Hunith and Gaius stop and stare at him.

"Mice?" Hunith says. "Oh, that's bad. I'll set the traps, then, before I see to the hydroponics."

"I don't think you need to," says Arthur slowly. "It was really strange. There were two mice, white - beautiful little things - I've never seen mice like that before. They weren't frightened at all. They came right up to me and let me catch them and carry them outside." His face goes hot. "I know it's stupid, but I couldn't bring myself to kill them. I took them to the meadows."

" _White_ mice?" Gaius's voice is sharp. "That's…"

"That's what?"

Gaius takes a breath, his face softening as if this is good news. "White mice are heralds of change."

That's the first Arthur's ever heard about it. "What kind of change?"

But Gaius leans down to arrange the firewood by the stove, pretending not to hear, and if he doesn't want to talk there's no point trying to make him. Arthur knows this well by now, so he only shakes his head and leaves for the fields.

***

_The darkness around him is green, like he's underwater. He's weightless, floating, tethered by tendrils of magic; his thoughts vague and inarticulate. It's like lucid dreaming. He's aware that the world is still awake and alive out there, that people are talking, moving, living their lives outside of his confinement. Time is nothing in here, but he knows it's flowing like an endless river beyond his field of vision and that he, alone, is an isle, untouched by it._

_Outside there's wind, fire, waves. There's roaring noise, and then there's silence._

_Two voices keep returning faithfully to talk to him, encourage him, give him news. He listens but doesn't know how to process the information here in the dim, green light. It's impossible to visualise the world that is described to him, so they use a spell to let part of his consciousness travel with them. He sees a world he knows, and doesn't know. A world old and new. He stores away this knowledge to be used when the time comes, because he knows the time will come when he will wake again._

_When he'll be free._


	9. Treasure

The sun is hot on the back of Arthur's neck as he takes the dirt track up to the North Field. It's one of the first warm days of spring and he turns his eyes to the sky, a blue, cloudless vault above him. Birds are chirping from the Forest and a sleepy bumblebee collides with his cheek, startling them both.

At the top of the field he stops and turns his back to the forest to look out over his land. 

_His_ land! If only.

Arthur closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, inhaling the scents of spring, of wet earth, new leaves, new grass. A smile tugs at his mouth. He does love this, loves being outdoors with his fingers in the soil, watching things grow, watching small miracles happen. 

If he'd had some choice in the matter, he thinks grimly, he'd have loved it even more. In a free world, he might still have been a farmer.

A free world. There doesn't seem to be much hope of that now.

He opens his eyes and shades them with his hand, frowning. He's lucky, he knows that. Lucky not to be killed that time he was whipped in the town square, lucky to be doing something he actually loves. How many people would happily choose to do what they're doing now if they were free to make the choice?

And still... 

In a way it was easier when he was younger, even if he didn't realise at the time. When you're young you're rarely allowed a choice anyway. You belong to someone. Your parents make decisions for you. But Arthur is twenty-two and has been running the farm since he was eighteen, and he has no choice, no hope of development or change. Even if he loves making things grow, this is what he'll do year after year until he dies. Either he'll die face down on his fields or die like his parents did - of illnesses that, before the Disasters, could have been easily cured. They could still have been cured, if his family had belonged to the privileged classes. If they'd had access to medicine and skilled care.

Morgana's voice come echoing through his mind, so clearly he jumps: _I really hate them, you know._ She had been talking about magicians, about Scamall, about those who think they have the right to decide where everyone belongs, decide what they can do and think, decide who lives and who dies.

Gaius had said something once, a quote from an old book perhaps, about beating swords into ploughshares. It means, of course, that you should stop fighting and put bread on people's tables instead, but Arthur's been putting bread on other people's tables all his life without getting all that much for himself. Morgana and Aglain had tried to distribute the bread more evenly between tables everywhere.

One day, Arthur thinks grimly, I hope we'll take our ploughshares and beat them into swords.

But he can't see it happening, and he is only one man. To do what he'd like to do he'd need an army.

Deep breath. Shake it off.

Arthur reaches down and grabs a fistful of soil, squeezes it in his hand, between his fingers. It's ready. He can get to work.

Work is good. It stops him thinking.

The North Field is always where he starts. It lies on the slight slope at the foot of The Burh, and it's the first field to dry out in the spring. The fields further down hold the moisture longer, which makes the soil colder. He always needs to leave them for a few more days than the North Field.

Time to go and get Hengroen, who is stabled at Lance's at the moment, and to get Lance's help if he has the time. Arthur hopes Leon is on his way to Cavalon, too. He usually arrives around this time.

Hengroen is the horse that Freya helped him find, after that awful time when Amelia collapsed here in the field. He's a strong, beautiful horse, quite young when they bought him but old enough to have been properly trained, old enough to be reliable. He was so well looked after that Arthur suspected Freya must have either called in a debt to get him, or paid part of the price for him herself. He has never asked her about it. She wouldn't want him to.

Hengroen is as good a companion as Amelia was, steady and kind.

Arthur walks across the fields towards Lance's, scanning the ground as he goes, grateful that the farm is where it is, where the old lake floor makes the soil deep and the land fertile. Besides, it's springtime, and this is when he finds the most useful odds and ends, brought to the surface by frost and thaw.

When he turned the soil last spring, the plough clanged into something so large and solid it broke the blade: a kind of steel cube with a door in it. It was so heavy he could barely turn it over, and it was hard to imagine it being brought here by the floods or a tidal wave during the Disasters. The force of the water must have been tremendous.

When Leon saw the steel cube he said it was a safe; a small, personal one. It's still securely locked, with no one in the world knowing the code. Arthur had decided to keep it even though it's of no use to him. It intrigues him. What kind of personal belongings could possibly go in a safe? The only assets he knows are either too large, like farm machinery, or insubstantial. Strength. Perseverance. Courage. Love.

Arthur placed the safe in the dry stone wall that stretches along the field, and it sits there like an enigma. Whatever the owner put in there is completely safe and will stay safe for a very long time, until someone with the right code comes along to open it.

Which will never happen.

Today's finds are a y-shaped piece of steel tubing and a length of not-too-rusty wire that Arthur loops around his arm. He'll take the steel tube to the junkyard later, see if it can buy him anything.

When he reaches Joyous Gard he finds Lance in the stable yard, holding Hengroen's head for Gwen. She's bent over Hengroen's left foreleg, examining his hoof. _Oh, please no. Not an injury. Not now, when we have so much work to do._

Arthur hurries up to them. "Is anything wrong?"

Lance turns his head and smiles. "Hello, Arthur. No, everything's fine. Gwen just wanted to check on him since… well, since she was here anyway."

Arthur breathes again. They would be lost without Hengroen. Like Amelia, he isn't just a horse but a companion, a friend, a fellow worker.

Arthur raises an eyebrow at Lance, grinning. "Oh, yeah, Gwen just _happened_ to be here."

Gwen looks up, a little red from bending down. "Hi, Arthur." She lets go of Hengroen's leg and straightens her back, patting his neck. "He's fine."

Arthur smiles at her. "Have you decided on a date yet?"

He loves to watch her squirm. It's kind of adorable, the way Lance and Gwen are still sheepish around him, still acting guilty even if it's been years. Arthur did love Gwen, he _does_ love her, but not like… it wasn't… it just wasn't right.

Gwen and Lance, now - that is absolutely right.

"Two months from now, we thought," Lance answers in her place. "After we've brought in the hay. Nothing fancy - I mean, not that we could afford anything fancy even if we wanted to, but by then there should at least be some more food to be had. Some meat, even."

"Well done, mate." Arthur throws an arm around Lances shoulders and pats him on the chest. 

He hugs Gwen, too. She smells of horses and sweat and something sweet, like the grass in the meadows. "I'm happy for you both."

Moisture collects at the corners of her eyes. "I know you are, Arthur. Thank you."

"So." Arthur turns to Lance again, reaching out a hand to cup Hengroen's soft nose. "The North Field's ready. I'd like to start up there today, if I can have Hengroen?"

Lance steps aside and makes a gesture towards the horse. "All yours. I want to get most of the kitchen gardens done today, then I'll come up and help. Is Leon coming, do you know?"

"I haven't heard anything but he should be on his way." Arthur looks up at Hengroen. "We need to get you a haircut," he tells the horse. "Your forelock's getting ridiculous."

"Let me do it," Gwen says. "I'll get the shears."

Lance puts an arm around her shoulders. "You know Gwen's been taking over more and more of the farrier's work from Tom. We thought it would be great for her to open her own business once we're married, running it from here. Leave the smithy to her dad."

"It's what he loves doing anyway," she says, smiling. "He's never been wild about horses."

"Whereas you have always been." Arthur looks at them. They're practically glowing. There's a tiny pinch at his heart, seeing them so happy. He loves them and no one deserves happiness better than these two, but once, just once, he'd like to be as happy as they are. "I think that's a great idea - and excellent for me, having the farrier next door. By the way, would you have any use for a piece of steel tubing?"

***

Arthur rides Hengroen back to Cavalon along the South Field at a leisurely pace. The sun is still beating down but there's a light breeze coming in from the southwest, carrying that faint smell of stagnant moisture that sometimes travels all the way here from the marshlands. The birds are singing their heads off in the Forest, and sky-blue forget-me-nots are nodding along the edge of the field. It's hard to imagine that all this was once wasteland, wrecked by the floods, charred by the wildfires.

"Whoa." Arthur reins in Hengroen. "What the hell is _that?"_

About ten steps into the field, something protrudes from the ground. It looks like it could be part of something larger, as if most of it is still buried. He'd better remove it before it's time to start working here. Things like that could cause a lot of trouble. Damage the plough. Make Hengroen lame.

Arthur slides off the horse and gives the shiny, black flank a pat before he walks over and leans down to examine the object. It looks like a handle or a grip of some kind, dusty and dirty, tarnished and darkened by time but sturdily made. When he closes his fingers around it it fits so perfectly in his hand that he draws a breath. It must have been made with considerable skill. He pulls hard, expecting resistance, but the thing isn't stuck. He nearly falls backwards with the momentum as it slides effortlessly out of the ground. 

Arthur takes a few staggering steps to regain his balance, frowning down at the object in his hand. Slowly he lifts it in front of his face and examines it, wondering if it is what he thinks it is. Made of metal, long and narrow, straight and flat - it's definitely a blade. Not a tool, but a weapon. His heart begins to pound.

A sword.

And it's beautiful. 

Planting his feet firmly apart he grips the sword with both hands and swings it back and forth, so the point draws a loose figure eight in the air. He repeats it over and over and marvels at the perfect balance. It feels so familiar, as if it's related to the wooden sword of his childhood and he's handled it a thousand times before. The edge of the blade is still sharp. The entire weapon seems completely intact - not broken, not jagged, not even blunted. Arthur runs a finger along the flat of the blade to remove the dirt. There's an inscription of some kind, but he can't read it.

He fishes out a piece of string from his pocket and makes a loop to hang the sword from his belt, but he's reluctant to let it leave his hand. It feels good there.

"Come on, then. Walk on," he says to Hengroen.

With the reins in one hand and the sword in the other, he continues along the field towards the farm. It feels like he should try to spin the sword in the air and catch it by the grip, like the sword is waiting for him to do it, so he does. It works like a charm and he can't help laughing to himself, purely from satisfaction. 

A bit further on, he spots a familiar figure waiting by the Cavalon gate. "Leon! You're here!"

Leon raises a hand in greeting and they meet in a backslapping hug. "Of course I'm here. Every year without fail."

Without fail is right, and Arthur is grateful. They'd be hard up without Leon's help.

"How are you keeping?"

"Good. Glad to have you back, it's good to see you."

"And you." Then Leon's gaze drops to Arthur's hand. He stills and his smile fades. "What the hell is…? Where did you get that?"

Arthur spins the sword again, grinning, showing off. "I just found it in the South Field. The grip was sticking up from the soil and I pulled it out. It looks like a sword to me, a real one. Don't you think so? It looks very well made. The blade is ornamented - look, it's really beautiful - and it balances like a dream. Here, try it."

Leon's eyes are fixed on the sword and he seems hesitant to take it, then holds out both his hands with his palms up so Arthur can place the sword across them. Slowly he turns it over, takes hold of the grip and lets the point make a figure eight in the air, just like Arthur did before. 

"Well, what do you think?" Arthur asks expectantly.

Without taking his eyes off it, Leon hands it back. "I think it belongs to you." It's an odd thing to say, but before Arthur can ask, Leon turns and points to one of the wooden gateposts. "Are the symbols still here?"

Arthur hangs the sword in his belt. "What symbols?"

Leon is smiling again. He leans down and sweeps away the high grass at the foot of the post, and points to two small groups of symbols carved into the wood. "Yep, still there."

Arthur frowns, leaning down to look. "I need to up my vigilance. I've actually never seen those. What are they?"

"I made these," Leon points, "a long time ago. And this other group, here, has been there since Hunith moved in. Gwaine made it." He grins at Arthur, straightening up. "Wanderer's marks. This one tells you there are good people in this house, and that one shows you'll get a good night's sleep here, not in the house but in the hayloft."

Arthur tilts his head, scratching the back of his head. "So you have your own language?"

"A wanderer's life can be hard. Sometimes we're threatened with rifles or chased off the land by dogs. This is a good way of warning each other off - don't go here, you're risking your life - or saying you can get a meal here, or these are good people, don't do them any harm."

"Do them harm? Does that happen?"

Leon straightens up. "Not really. Not often, anyway. Mostly it's the other way round - most wanderers are peaceful creatures. Some aren't always respectful of belongings, though. Or of women's right to their own bodies."

"I see," says Arthur slowly. "But I'm guessing that kind of wanderer wouldn't follow your symbols or codes of ethics anyway."

"No, I suppose you're right. Anyway, the second group of symbols means that you'll get food here. Those are the ones that were carved after Hunith moved in. Not that you were stingy with food before, but after your mother died, there was hardly ever anyone in when we arrived, at least not in summer. You were always out in the field or the woods."

Arthur shakes his head. "You learn something new every day. You mentioned Gwaine - is he on his way, too?"

"He should be here in a day or two."

They walk up to the house, the sword bouncing against Arthur's thigh with each step.

"How are things otherwise?" Leon asks.

Arthur frowns. "Well, we're all fine, but we've had things going missing from the kitchen garden and the hydroponics house lately. It's kind of strange. There's not a lot taken, not even enough to fill one person's stomach. Hunith only noticed after a while. A head of lettuce here, a few carrots there. Radishes. Small things like that. It makes it difficult for us all the same. The Nim think we've taken it ourselves. Since the Glesting fence was built we haven't had anything stolen at all until now."

"Don't you keep the hydroponics house locked?"

Arthur shakes his head. "There's been no need for a lock. It's only closed with a latch, so you could just slide in a blade and lift the latch if you wanted to. I've set a trip alarm now, though, so I hope we'll have our culprit soon."

***

When they're seated around the table in the evening, Arthur looks at Leon and wonders how it's possible for him to look exactly the same as he did when Arthur was a child. He doesn't know how old Leon is but he'd guess around thirty, maybe a little more. He must have been quite young back then, but he doesn't seem to have changed at all.

Leon has told them so many stories, fairytales of old and tales from his own travels, but never very much about himself. Where does he come from? Why did he choose to be a wanderer? Perhaps he'd had no choice, perhaps something had forced him from his home, some kind of tragedy. Or he just wanted to roam, like Elyan.

One day Arthur will ask, but not tonight. He's too tired, and besides, his mind is still occupied with the sword. He's never been very attached to things - not that he's had much to be attached to - but he already feels like the sword is _his_. He wouldn't want to see it in anyone else's hand. It's ridiculous.

Gaius is talking to Leon and Hunith is listening with a smile, giving Leon a second helping of food, when the trip alarm goes off.

Arthur and Leon are on their feet in a split second. They look at one another and Arthur nods. "Let's go. Take the kitchen door, but give me a minute to get around to the other end."

As quietly as he can, Arthur takes the rifle from its hook by the door and slips out. He avoids the gravel and runs along the strip of grass, following the wall of the hydroponics house to the door at the other end. When he hears Leon burst through the door at the kitchen end, Arthur rushes in.

The thief jumps back from the carrot bed with a shriek. Arthur and Leon stop on either side of her, blocking her escape and exchanging an astonished look.

It's a girl, no more than fifteen or so, with huge, frightened eyes. She's holding a carrot in one hand, and a lettuce leaf peeks out from the corner of her mouth. Arthur feels his anger fizzle out of him. Instead, he wants to laugh.

He raises his eyebrows. "So… are you human or rabbit?"

Bewildered, the girl looks from him to Leon and back again. "What? I…"

"I mean…" Arthur is grinning now. "Lettuce and carrots?"

It's like she didn't hear. 

"Please don't hurt me," she whispers, cowering. "I'm sorry, I know the Nim come to collect from you and everything… but I was so hungry!"

Arthur's smile slides off his face. "Well, I think we all know what that feels like. But you haven't made things any easier for us with the Nim, you know." Where could she possibly come from? Not from the village - the fence would see to that. "What are we going to do with you, then? Caught red-handed - I should just hand you over to the Nim." He takes the girl by the arm and she whimpers. His grip isn't hard, so it must be his words more than any physical pain. "Let's get you inside and hear what you have to say for yourself. And put that carrot back."

She's trembling when they enter the kitchen.

Hunith turns around at the sink. "Oh, is this our thief? I had expected someone… bigger."

The girl relaxes visibly when she sees Hunith. It occurs to Arthur that she thought they would take her inside and take advantage of her. Hungry and abused… He's beginning to feel sorry for her.

He lets go of her arm and gives her a gentle shove towards the table. "Sit down."

Without a word, she slides in on the bench next to Gaius.

"I'm guessing you're still hungry," Hunith says. "We don't have much but there's some soup left, and you can have a slice of bread."

The girl's eyes fill with tears. "Oh. Thank you. That would be _wonderful_."

"What's your name?" Arthur asks.

"Elena."

Beside her, Gaius frowns. "Elena. That's an unusual name. How old are you?"

"Fifteen… almost." She swallows and adds in a whisper: "Tomorrow's my birthday."

Gaius is looking at her sharply. "You're not Godwin's daughter, are you?"

"Oh!" She jumps and her cheeks flood with colour. "Yes, I am. Did you know my father?"

"I did. I know he died a few years ago, but I never knew what became of you. Was there a relative who could take care of you?"

Elena shakes her head. "No, I was sent to... to an orphanage. In Welle. Maybe you know it."

"I do," says Hunith, setting a steaming bowl on the table in front of the girl. "I lived in Welle for many years. That orphanage has rather a bad reputation. Did you run away? Is that why you're sneaking around stealing food from honest people?"

Elena's colour deepens, and she nods. "It's a bad place. I couldn't… I had to get away."

"It's an orphanage for magicless people," says Hunith dryly, "run by magicians."

"I'm going to go out on a limb here," Arthur says to Elena, "and guess they weren't treating you fantastically well?"

Elena shakes her head, biting her lip.

"Still, they must have given you food and a roof over your head," says Gaius sternly, "since you're here to tell the tale. That's something to be grateful for."

"Yes, they did. The orphanage isn't so bad when you're small. Miss Catrina, the headmistress, is good with the small kids. But then there's Mr Jonas, and he… well, he leaves the younger girls alone but by the time you turn fifteen, he…" She swallows and looks down. "I _had_ to get away."

Arthur and Hunith exchange a look.

"I see," says Arthur grimly. "Eat your soup while it's hot. We can talk more later."

"Thank you," she whispers.

Arthur nods sideways towards the door, and Hunith steps outside with him. It's a lovely evening, cool and still. A blackbird sings in the orchard.

"I've heard things about that orphanage," Hunith says. "If we send her back, god knows what will happen to her. Some of the older girls are sent to magicians' houses for… well, to provide amusement."

Arthur nods, scraping at the ground with the toe of his boot. He wouldn't want to do that to anyone. "I don't really see how we can afford one more person in the household, and how do we explain it to the Nim? She's no farm worker, and I don't think the Nim would allow us more rations."

Hunith gives him a stern look, very like her uncle. "It's your farm, Arthur, I'm well aware of that. But can you live with yourself if we send her back?"

She's already won this argument and she knows it. When he doesn't reply, she smiles. He laughs a little, shaking his head. "You know me too well, Hunith."

"Yes, I do," she says softly, "and you're a good man. I'm sure she's willing to work if we give her the chance to stay."

The soup has made Elena perk up. The colour in her cheeks now isn't from embarrassment but from warmth and energy, and her eyes shine as she talks to Gaius about her father.

"I thought Godwin's daughter had magic," Gaius is saying as Arthur and Hunith sit down at the table.

The colour in Elena's face drains away. She nods, her eyes frightened. "Yes. I have magic. It's not that strong, I don't think, but I'm not really sure since I never got to use it much. Father wanted to keep it a secret. He must have really trusted you, if he told you that."

"Why did he want to keep it secret? I'd have thought having magic would serve you well."

"My father…" Elena takes a deep breath. "He was… well, if you knew him you must have known he wasn't exactly a favourite with the Nim. He wasn't very good at following orders." Her smile is sad. "He always said that sooner or later they'd make up a reason to have him killed, and they did." She looks down. "He was afraid that if he died before I was of age, I'd be sent to the power plant. It would be better for me if they thought I was magicless. Then they'd only put me in the orphanage. Only!" She wipes at her eyes. "I suppose he was right, though. I've heard terrible things about the power plant."

"Hunith and I have discussed what to do with you," Arthur says.

Elena winces, nearly knocking over her soup bowl. "Oh, please don't send me back. Please let me stay here! I can work, I don't know anything about farming but I can sew and cook and I have magic, I'm sure there are things I can do if you let me stay! Or just let me go. Please don't send me back to the orphanage, and please, please, _please_ don't hand me over to the Nim."

"Well," says Hunith dryly, "if you can sew you'll earn your keep as far as I'm concerned. All of us here are useless with the needle. You'd have plenty of work to do, catching up with everything we've neglected."

"Yes, I can sew, I'm really good at it! _Please_ let me stay!"

"You'd have to work hard," Arthur says. "We can't afford to feed anyone who doesn't pull her weight. Do you still go to school?"

Elena shakes her head. "No, I mean, we were taught at the orphanage, but now that I've left…"

"Good. Then you'll be available to Hunith for anything she needs, and you'll help with the hay and the harvest and anything else we need more hands for."

"Oh, yes," Elena whispers.

"That's settled, then. You'll stay. I'll go and talk to the Nim in the morning."

"You can share a room with me," Hunith says.

Leon leans back on his chair, smiling. "Have you any idea how lucky you were, Elena, coming to this farm of all the farms you could have picked?"

"I'm beginning to see it," says Elena.

Then she puts her head on the table and bursts into tears.

***

In all the excitement with Elena, Arthur's almost forgotten about his sword. It's leaning against the wall in his bedroom. Now he fetches it and brings it to the table.

Elena's been tucked into bed, exhausted, and Hunith comes back down the stairs.

"Poor girl," she says. "No doubt she'll be sleeping like a log until morning. I think it's been a long time since she's been either warm or felt safe - or had a full stomach. Oh, what's that?"

Gaius, who is just coming in from the chicken coop, follows her gaze and stops dead, staring.

"Do you know what it is, Gaius?" Arthur asks. "I found it in the South Field today."

It doesn't escape him that Leon and Gaius exchange a look.

"Hey," he says. "What's going on here? Do you know something I don't?"

"No," says Gaius and comes up to the table, transfixed. He reaches out and touches the sword almost reverently. "Only that this is obviously a very old sword, and if I'm not mistaken, a valuable one. If it's come to you, then that's where it's supposed to be. In your hand." 

_I think it belongs to you_ , Leon had said out by the gate. They do know something about this sword, and Arthur wants to find out what it is.

"I think we can be sure of one thing at least," says Gaius.

"What?"

"White mice really do herald change."


	10. Hilltop

The morning feels sleepy like it hasn't quite woken up when Arthur takes Hengroen up to the North Field again. The air is cool and the birds are singing in the Sapling Forest; there's a light mist in the air and the grass is still sparkling with dew. Arthur inhales the moist air deeply and smiles to himself. He loves this kind of weather, soft and mild after the harshness of winter. Good for things that grow.

The Burh with the Fire Oak rises out of the mists like a ship lost in a ghostly sea of grey - not that Arthur's ever seen a ship except in pictures, and even pictures are scarce. Gaius calls it the Fata Morgana, this strange effect where The Burh seems to float above the ground.

The name makes Arthur think of his sister and his parents, and how lonely he was before his new family began to form. Now he has Gaius and Hunith, and, it seems, Elena as well. But he still misses his parents. He misses Morgana so much it hurts.

"I hate that they're gone," Arthur says out loud to Hengroen. "I hate that they're gone and there was so much I never asked them. So much they never told me."

The horse's ears move as if he's listening, and he turns his head and pushes gently at Arthur's arm with his nose.

Arthur smiles. "You greedy brute, you - asking for a carrot before we've even done any work! You'll have one later. First we need to get this field ploughed."

The earth is soft and Arthur only needs to stop twice, to remove a large piece of old, rotting wood from their path and once to pick up a rock. He throws it into the grass at the edge of the field to be picked up later and put in the drystone wall. While he watches the plough turn up clods of soil he wonders what he'll find in the field today.

The beautifully crafted sword is leaning against the wall in his bedroom. He wonders what he's going to do with it, if anything. It's silly of him to want to keep it, perhaps, but he does want to keep it. Really, really wants to keep it. The way it feels in his hand… like an extension of his arm. A powerful extension. Long ago there were swords forged in dragon fire, Gaius had said. It sounds partly like one of those old fairy tales and partly completely right. Like this sword could, no, _should_ , be one of those. Something so beautiful must have a strange and mysterious past.

By noon both Arthur and his horse are drenched with sweat and the entire North Field is done. The sun hasn't come out and the mist hasn't cleared, and dark clouds are gathering from the west. Arthur takes Hengroen up to the spring at the foot of The Burh where they both drink and Arthur refills his water bottle. In summer, the spring is framed by ferns, cool in the shade beneath the canopies of trees at the edge of the Forest. Now the boughs and branches above him have a thin veil of green and the ferns are only visible as small, brown knots waiting to unfurl, but the grass grows thick and green around the lip of the spring. 

It's a peaceful place but Arthur is restless. Maybe he could take his lunch to the top of the hill. He hasn't been up there for ages.

He ties Hengroen to a tree and leaves him to graze, and sets off through the Sapling Forest and up the slope of The Burh.

The Fire Oak is still standing, refusing to die. Every spring there's a new burst of tiny leaves at the tips of the twisted branches, stretching towards the sky like leafy fingers trying to reach the clouds.

Some say the old tree was hidden by magic for a thousand years and made visible again by the High Priestess after the Disasters, but why would anyone hide a tree? There's talk about ghosts and strange noises at the top of the hill, about dancing lights and eerie song. Arthur has never seen or heard any of this, Morgana said she hadn't either, and if there had been any truth to these rumours they'd have known, having lived in view of the hill all their lives. Neither is Arthur afraid of the tree, like others seem to be. He only feels reverence towards it, for its age, as a survivor from the old days.

He puts a hand on its trunk now, patting it like a horse, running his fingers over the rough ridges of bark. There's no trace of ghosts or whispers.

Arthur draws a deep breath and turns to look out over the fields, but everything is obscured by mist. He didn't come here for the view anyway. He came to be alone, which is ridiculous - he's always alone in the fields. But the loneliness up here is different, somehow. Like a choice rather than necessity.

He sits down at the foot of the Fire Oak, leaning against it. The ground is cold and too damp to sit on, so he makes himself comfortable on one of the gnarled roots and takes out his lunch. Two generous slices of bread. A fried egg - a true luxury. Some of the dried meat he got from Lance. Some dried fruit. Arthur can't wait to get fresh fruit and vegetables from the kitchen garden again. They always taste better than the produce from the hydroponics house. There are already plenty of fresh herbs and soon there will be will be asparagus and strawberries… His mouth waters. Bread seems a bit bleak in comparison, but who is he to complain? At least he _has_ bread. 

Just as he washes down the last of his lunch with water, a raindrop hits his face. It's quickly followed by another, and another. Arthur scrambles to his feet. The clouds coming up from the west are so dark they're nearly black, and thunder begins to rumble. Isn't it a bit early in the season for thunder?

A flash of lightning splits the sky in half, reminding Arthur that it's a really bad idea to be standing underneath a tree on the top of an exposed hill. He gathers up his things and starts to run, but he isn't fast enough. Another flash of lightning and a deafening crack send him tumbling to the ground, sprawling in the grass. 

His ears are ringing as he blinks the world back into focus and sits up, disoriented. Breathe in, breathe out, straighten out arms and legs... At least he isn't hurt. His limbs are working and his heart didn't jump out of his chest.

A huge whorl of dark clouds is centered above the Fire Oak, spinning and billowing above it. Lightning strikes again, making Arthur wince. This time there's no noise. For an instant, the tree is brightly lit with every little detail showing sharply. The silence frightens Arthur more than the noise did. The air around him is crackling with electricity and the hairs on his arms stand up. Everything holds its breath for a second before the sky opens and rain comes down in torrents, but the tree and a small circle around it are perfectly dry. So is Arthur, apart from the first few raindrops that hit him before he ran. It's raining so hard he can't see anything beyond the top of The Burh. Right now, this moment, the whole world comprises a circle of grass around an ancient oak tree on top of a hill - and Arthur, in the eye of the storm. 

Another flash of lightning, still completely silent, is followed by a loud, grating, creaking noise - it's coming from the tree. Before Arthur can collect himself enough to get up and run, the tree splits slowly from top to bottom. The two halves separate but don't part entirely, revealing something that's been hidden in the tree… Arthur is up from the grass now, taking a step closer to see. There's something inside the tree, standing upright - something that falls out of the crack into the grass; something pale that lies absolutely still.

Arthur's mouth opens. He isn't sure whether he intended to say something, or scream, or if it's just that his jaw dropped.

It's not some _thing_. It's some _one_.

Arthur runs up and falls to his knees beside the man in the grass. He's young, Arthur's age perhaps, stark naked and so pale his skin looks greenish. He's slim with dark hair and long limbs, long black lashes resting in perfect, feathery crescents against his cheeks. 

Arthur reaches out and places two cautious fingers on the side of the man's neck. The pulse is faint but it's there, and Arthur releases a nervous breath. Underneath his fingertips the pale skin is cold and clammy. The rain keeps hissing down around them.

"Hello?" Arthur starts at the sound of his own voice, dull and flat above the sound of rain. "Can you hear me?"

There's no reaction, but when he places a hand on the pale forehead and leans closer, the eyelashes flutter and the man opens his eyes. They wander for a moment before settling on Arthur's face. At first they're empty, absent, until a strange look of recognition awakens in them. The man's lips move, and Arthur leans down and puts his ear close to hear.

What he hears is his own name.

A small, choked noise gets stuck in his throat and he almost falls backwards in the grass.

"Arthur." The voice is steadier this time, audible above the noise of the rain. "You're here."

Then the man's eyes close and he sinks back into unconsciousness.

The rain is coming down so heavily that Arthur can't see anything at all outside of their dry little clearing. He stands up, looking around, unsure what to do. 

All of a sudden something materialises out of the grey curtain of rain. It's Freya.

She runs towards Arthur with one hand pointing towards the whirling clouds and the other gesticulating frantically at him. "Get him down to the Forest! Now!"

"What?"

"To the Forest! Get him down there, so he's not visible to the entire world! I'll keep the rain going until you're hidden. I'll make him lighter so you can carry him if you need to. Go, go, go!"

"What, are you creating the storm?"

"For heaven's sake, Arthur! Explanations later. Just _go_!"

Arthur grits his teeth and looks down at the man, still unconscious in the grass. He leans down and hoists him up, slings one of the slack arms around his own neck and holds the inert body up by the waist. The man is stirring now, muttering.

"Merlin," Freya says, and her voice has a tone Arthur's never heard before. "Merlin, you're here! Arthur, you know the big chestnut tree halfway down, a little off the path? Take him there, hide under the hanging boughs. I'll catch up with you once I've restored the oak."

The man named Merlin is half conscious now, trying to hold himself upright as Arthur hurries as best he can down the path. They're out of the dry clearing and the rain is coming down in sheets. It feels like forever before they reach the edge of the Forest and follow the wet path, slipping and stumbling.

The boughs of the chestnut tree touch the ground, hanging down like a wide skirt. The new leaves offer just enough protection.

Arthur ducks in underneath them, placing a hand on top of Merlin's head to protect him from the branches. Under the tree the ground is covered with soft grass, and Merlin half falls down on it. Arthur removes his shirt and drapes it over Merlin's body like an inadequate blanket, covering as much of it as he can, wishing he had something for a pillow. He sighs, sits down and lets Merlin's head rest in his lap.

Merlin opens his eyes. They're blue and slightly unfocused.

"You're here," he repeats.

"Yes," Arthur admits, laughing a little because the whole thing is so absurd and he doesn't know what else to do. "I guess I am."

"I've been waiting for you."

There's nothing to do but take it in his stride. "Have you?"

Merlin smiles faintly, his eyes falling shut again. "Yes, I have. I've waited a thousand years."


	11. Merlin

"Arthur," Freya breathes outside the curtain of leaves.

"I'm here."

She ducks in under the boughs and falls on her knees beside Merlin, touching his face. "Oh, Merlin. At last."

He opens his eyes and his hand comes up to catch hers. "Freya."

Tears hang in her eyelashes, or maybe it's just rain. She looks up at Arthur. "Let's take him to Cavalon."

Arthur starts. "To Cavalon? Why? Can't you take him back to yours?"

Freya smiles a little. "I think Cavalon is where he needs to be."

Arthur scowls at her. "Don't be mysterious, Freya. You have to tell me what's happening here."

"I will, I promise, once we get Merlin home. You have Hengroen with you, haven't you?"

Once they get Merlin _home_.

"He's down by the spring."

"We'll get Merlin on him, then."

"Hengroen," Merlin says dazedly, as if remembering something from a dream. "I can't believe it. Arthur and you… even the horse. Is everything coming together, then?"

"We're close," says Freya. There's an edge to her voice, as if she's warning him off from more questions at the moment. "Can you use your magic yet?"

Merlin shakes his head where it lies in Arthur's lap. "I don't think so. I'll try to sit up now - that's about the extent of my abilities at the moment."

Freya's face relaxes. "Lucky I can use mine, then. I'm sorry, Merlin, but we'll have to hide you. I'll cloak you. I don't think you should be seen. Not yet."

It's a strange walk home - Arthur in his undershirt, leading Hengroen, Freya walking on the other side of the horse, and on Hengroen's back an invisible rider.

"Are you alright up there?" Arthur asks as they reach the bottom of the field.

"It's a good thing your horse is so calm," says Merlin's voice out of nowhere. "I'm a bit wobbly."

The comedy of the situation makes Arthur grin. "And if you fall off we won't notice since we can't see you."

"If I fall off, I'll make sure you hear me!" says Merlin crossly.

Arthur laughs. "I suggest you don't fall off, then! It'll be difficult to help an invisible person back on the horse."

Merlin grumbles and from Freya comes a sound Arthur's never heard her make before: she snorts.

"Listen to the two of you! Half an hour after Merlin wakes up from his thousand-year sleep, you're bickering."

"Just like old times," says Merlin's free-floating voice, but there's a smile in it.

"Very old times," Freya agrees.

Arthur frowns, peering over Hengroen's back to see her face. "What are you talking about?"

Freya turns away. "Nothing. Let's leave it for later."

***

After Merlin's dark, hazy existence in the tree, the world is so clear and sharp and bright he needs to squint. He's been enclosed on all sides for so long it's a challenge to sit upright on the horse's back and keep his balance. Every muscle in his body aches, but it's a jubilant feeling, to be alive. The breeze is cool and soft against his face and arms and the air smells of spring, of damp earth and new, green things. The horse's sides are warm under his legs and he sways with its movement. He's back in the world, back with people he loves.

He looks out over the road at their feet, at the buildings in the distance which must be the farm where they're heading. Halfway there, he turns and looks back at the Tor - The Burh - where the tower is long gone and there's only the oak tree left. His thousand-year prison.

The lake is gone, too. The ground underneath them is the lake floor. This is where he pushed the boat from the shore to take Arthur's body to Avalon. This is where Freya died in his arms. This is where she returned and handed him Excalibur, and where he threw it back in.

There's so much grief connected with this place and Merlin still feels it, but it's mixed with joy now, and determination.

Arthur may not be a king any more but he still looks regal; tall and blond with broad shoulders and a strong profile. Being invisible has its advantages - Merlin can stare at Arthur to his heart's content. He wants the road to the farm to be endless, just so he can keep looking.

If Arthur has returned it's because the world needs him, and Merlin will be by his side whatever may come. This time, he won't fail to protect him.

***

By the time they reach the farm Merlin has recovered some of his strength. He slides off the horse on his own and lands on his feet, and Freya removes the cloaking charm. Merlin looks down at his pale limbs and Arthur's shirt tied around his hips.

"I don't look very... presentable?"

"With a bit of luck," says Arthur, "no one's in. I'll get you some clothes."

The farmhouse kitchen is large and homely with bunches of dried herbs hanging from the ceiling, pots and pans on the wall by the range, a butcher's block and a round wood table. 

Merlin has just pulled on the clothes Arthur got for him when a door creaks and Gaius comes in.

"Arthur, you're back early! Is something wrong? Have you - " Gaius stops dead and drops the basket he's been carrying. It falls on its side and herbs spill out on the floor. "Merlin! Oh, Merlin, my boy."

Tears ache in Merlin's throat as he embraces the old man, and Gaius wipes his eyes.

Arthur stares them with a crease between his eyebrows. "Do you two _know_ each other? Would someone just tell me what the hell's going on here?"

"We will," Freya says, "but I'd like to wait for Leon. Is he over at Joyous Gard?"

"Yes. I'll go over and get him."

"Ask Lance and Gwen to come, too. And ask them to bring some food. I'm going home for some as well."

***

With Arthur and Freya gone, the kitchen is quiet. Merlin and Gaius look at each other and smile.

"I'm so glad you're back, Merlin. I can't quite believe it - after all this time!" Gaius reaches out and places his hand over Merlin's. "Nimueh's magic is strong. I'm not sure I ever truly believed you would escape the tree."

"Her magic is strong, but even the most powerful spells can begin to fade after a thousand years. I don't know if that's what happened, or if it was simply time for me to come back. Arthur is back, after all."

"And so is everyone else. It has to mean something. Freya and Leon have been saying for years that you'll be coming back."

"They've been coming to the tree to see me all this time," Merlin says. "Well, not _see_ exactly, but you know what I mean. All these centuries."

"They wanted to keep you up to date with the world. Could you talk to them?"

"I could communicate with Freya through our magic. I couldn't speak, only convey images to her." Merlin pauses, trying to think how to describe his existence in the tree. "It was like being in that state just before you fall asleep, when you can still hear people around you but you can't move or say anything." He crouches down to pick up the herbs Gaius dropped on the floor. "But enough about me for now - how are you keeping, Gaius? You look well."

"I am well, thank you. Largely thanks to Arthur, I may add. I lived in the village before, where life is much harder in many ways than life on the farms. Arthur asked me to move here. I get to feel useful by helping him out with the herb patch and the chickens, and he gives me a safe place to stay. He's a good man in this lifetime, too, Merlin."

"I never doubted it." Merlin picks up a sprig of thyme and rubs it between his thumb and forefinger. "He seems a bit different, though. Quieter. More serious."

Gaius laughs a little. "He's not a spoiled prince, if that's what you mean."

Merlin smiles and hands over the basket of herbs to Gaius. "I guess that is what I mean, yes." 

There are footsteps outside, voices and laughter, and a blond girl comes stumbling in with an armful of rhubarb that she unceremoniously dumps on the butcher's block. "Oh, hello! I didn't know anyone was in."

She looks familiar but Merlin can't remember her name. A woman follows, a bunch of cowslips in one hand and radishes in the other. When she turns and her face catches the light, Merlin's heart leaps in his chest: it's his mother.

He tries to say something but can't get the words out, only a croak. From far away, he hears Gaius say: "Hunith, this is Merlin."

"Hello," says Hunith pleasantly. There's no recognition in her eyes.

Merlin swallows his heartbeat along with a lump in his throat and fights his urge to throw himself into her arms. It would be so wonderful to feel loved again.

"Arthur's on his way with Leon, Lance and Gwen," says Gaius. "Freya will be coming, too. So if we could have supper a little early…?"

Hunith takes it in her stride. "Of course. Are we celebrating something? Or is something wrong?"

Gaius shakes his head, smiling. "No, nothing's wrong, Hunith. Nothing at all."

***

It's strange and wonderful to sit in the kitchen at Cavalon Farm surrounded by familiar faces - Arthur, Gaius, Hunith, Leon, Lance, Gwen, Freya, Elena - and Gwaine, who arrived at the farm in perfect time for supper. Back then, Merlin had had to watch them die one by one until only he and Leon were left. Brothers in misfortune.

"Well, then," Arthur says. "Now that we're all here, I think it's time for Merlin to tell his story."

Merlin clears his throat. "Sit back and make yourselves comfortable. This is going to take a while."

***

The kitchen is silent as Merlin finishes. Elena's eyes are enormous. Lance and Gwen are leaning against each other, holding hands. Hunith only looks puzzled but Arthur is so pale Merlin's heart constricts.

Then everyone starts talking at once. 

"How is it possible to live inside a tree trunk for a thousand years?" Elena cries.

"Magic," Merlin says. "Powerful magic. And Nimueh didn't want to kill me, she wanted me to suffer. She wanted me as a trophy. A secret one."

Gwen puts a hand on Leon's arm. "You must have been so lonely!"

Leon's smile is sad. "I don't know if the Druids meant to save me or punish me when they had me drink from the Cup of Life. I must say it's been more of the latter. But when I saw you come back, one after the other, I felt it had all been worth it."

"So it's true," Arthur says and swallows. "All Leon's stories about kings and knights and swordfights… they're actually true."

Merlin smiles at him. "They're not only true - they're all about _you_. All of you here around the table, and about me, and the life we lived back then."

"I wanted to keep the stories alive," Leon says. "I knew you'd never hear them at school. And I told them because I wanted to know if any of you remembered. Only Gaius did." 

Gwaine leans back on his chair and grins, placing a heavy hand on Arthur's shoulder. "Well, just like Princess here I don't remember a thing, but I don't find the idea of me as a brave and noble knight entirely unlikely!"

Arthur scowls, everyone laughs, and Arthur says acidly to Leon: "It's interesting that in all this time, you haven't mentioned Merlin even once. I'd say he's quite an important character in the story."

Leon scratches his beard, looking sheepish. "Well, I'm good with keeping secrets and terrible at telling lies. If I'd talked about Merlin you'd have asked questions, and I'd have had to tell you about the Fire Oak. I didn't want to do that, because as far as we knew," he nods towards Freya, "only three people knew what was hidden in the tree - the two of us, and Nimueh, who trapped Merlin there in the first place. We wanted to keep it that way."

"You've been trapped in that tree for a thousand years. Why was it possible to escape it now?" Elena asks Merlin. "Did the spells stop working, or were you strong enough to get out on your own?"

"I'm not sure what happened. Arthur came up to the tree, and I believe his presence sparked the whole chain of events. There was a thunderstorm and the tree was hit, and it just opened for me."

Arthur looks skeptical. "How could my presence spark a thunderstorm? I don't have magic. I thought the thunderstorm was your doing, Freya."

She shakes her head. "No, I didn't start it. I saw the storm as it centered over The Burh and realised something must be about to happen, so I ran up there and found you with Merlin. I kept the rain falling to stop anyone seeing what was happening, and I restored the tree."

Merlin meets Arthur's eyes and holds his gaze. "I believe it was simply time for me to return. It was said that King Arthur would return when Albion's need was greatest, and I swore I'd be your servant until the day I died." He gives Arthur a faint smile. "So when you came back, I had to come back, too. Well, here I am. And this time, Sire, I will not fail you."

For a moment time stands still and there's only Merlin and Arthur in the room. Heat blazes through Merlin's veins. Even after a thousand years his love for Arthur remains undiminished, and maybe, _maybe_ , Arthur will remember who he was. Who they both were. 

"We need to drink to that," says Gaius.

A bottle of white liquor and one of blackberry brandy land on the table and they all drink to Merlin's promise and the return of the king.

When the noise dies down, Hunith asks: "If everyone here is a king or queen or knight, then who am I?"

Leon, Freya and Gaius turn towards Merlin, who swallows. He takes Hunith's hand and places it on his cheek, holds it there while he asks quietly: "Don't you remember?"

Hunith looks into Merlin's eyes for several long seconds, and her face changes. Very gently she pulls her hand out from under his and strokes his hair, combs her fingers through it. Her eyes fill with tears as she says slowly, dazedly, as if in a dream: "I'm your mother."

"Yes," Merlin whispers, choked. 

She stands up and pulls him to her. Unable to hold back his tears, Merlin leans his head against her and closes his eyes. He's back where he belongs. He's home.

***

Arthur walks through the orchard, along the edge of the meadow where the wind whispers in the long grass, flattening it in silvery streaks. It moves the leaves of the fruit trees and ruffles his hair as he looks for something to kick. Kicking at grass doesn't satisfy.

The sun is setting and there's a sharp chill in the air. It smells like rain and Arthur shivers. He left the house so abruptly he didn't think to grab a coat or jumper; he just needed to get out. At the bottom of the orchard is the stump of an old, dead apple tree. That will do nicely.

He kicks it until his toes hurt.

So, what now? Should he just go back inside and look stupid for flouncing out like a miffed teenager?

He hadn't been miffed, though. He'd been swallowing tears.

It's certainly been a day.

A previous life. People falling out of trees. Or they had drunk from the Cup of Life and couldn't die, or they were the Lady of the Lake - a lake that isn't there any more.

It's enough to make anyone's head spin, but that wasn't what made Arthur leave the room. It was the unfairness of it all.

Apparently Arthur is fated to lose his mother in every lifetime, but Merlin can come back after a thousand years and find his.

Arthur gives the tree stump another kick. _Ow._

"Arthur?"

At the sound of Merlin's voice he turns around reluctantly. He can't think of anything to say.

"You must be cold. Here." Merlin holds out a jumper, the blue wool one Hunith knitted for Arthur last winter.

He snatches it out of Merlin's hand and pulls it on, and points to the bench encircling the trunk of the largest cherry tree. "Let's sit."

For a while they sit side by side in silence. The wind ruffles Merlin's hair and whips colour into his cheeks. He's beautiful in a weird way, with his sharp cheekbones and pretty mouth and those blue eyes that disappear in crinkles when he laughs.

And he pledged Arthur his allegiance.

Merlin leans forward with his forearms on his thighs, turning to look up into Arthur's face. "Are you alright?"

Arthur shrugs. "To be honest, I don't know. This has been a strange day." After a pause, he adds: "You seem to feel better, though. You're less green."

It's true; Merlin does look better. Like a real, live person rather than the pale ghost of a man who fell out of the tree. His cheeks dimple and his smile touches something deep inside Arthur, makes something slot into place that he never knew was misaligned. 

It makes Arthur kind of breathless and then it makes him annoyed, and maybe a bit scared. It's like his feelings aren't his own, like another person's emotions have entered his chest; a bond that's not between Merlin and him but between Merlin and the Arthur of old. It can't be possible to feel something so strong for someone you've only just met. A complete stranger.

Because no matter what Merlin says and how well he claims to know Arthur, Arthur doesn't know _him_.

"Of course I look better," Merlin says in response to something Arthur's already forgotten. He's still smiling. "I've eaten for the first time in a thousand years! And had a shower for the first time in my life. Warm indoor rain - great invention."

Reluctantly, Arthur smiles back. "Yeah, it is." He leans back against the tree trunk. Dusk is falling, blue and frail, lighting tiny pinpricks of stars in the sky.

"You don't remember anything from… from back then?" Merlin asks in a low voice. "I thought, for a moment, in the kitchen…"

Arthur grits his teeth. It's like being in a play that everyone knows but him. He's supposed to be the protagonist but he's forgotten all of his lines and even what the play is about, and Merlin is prompting him, waiting for him to catch on and remember.

He shakes his head. "No. Nothing."

Merlin looks down at his hands. "I don't know whether to be sad or relieved about that."

"Why would you be relieved?"

"Because…" Merlin swallows. "I failed you. My job, my task, was to protect you. My whole life was about that. Everything I did… And then, in the end, I was too late to save you."

Arthur closes his eyes. He can relate to that. The image of Morgana in the town square is still painful, still far too clear in his mind. He had promised to protect her and didn't.

"I'm sure you did everything you could," he says gruffly. If only he could say the same for himself.

When he opens his eyes, Merlin is looking at him intently. He looks guilty. Sad. Hopeful. "Yes. But sometimes it's not enough."

Arthur shivers. "It's cold. We should go back inside." He gets up from the bench, rubbing his hands over his arms. "But I have to ask you something first."

"Yes?"

"Back then… were we… did we…" He doesn't know how to ask this. "Were we more than friends?"

Merlin takes a deep, shaky breath. "I was your servant, your confidant, your counsel. I was your bodyguard, even if you didn't know it. I saved your life so many times I lost count, and you saved mine. We were far more than friends, but not in the way I think you mean. We weren't… lovers." He stands, a sad smile sitting at the corners of his mouth. "But I did love you. I don't think I knew how much, or in what way, but when you were gone I realised I loved you in every possible way. Let's go inside."

"What about me?" Arthur wants to ask. "Did I love you?" 

But it would be an unfair question. Merlin wouldn't know the answer to it, and perhaps Arthur can answer it himself. If the Arthur of then was anything like the Arthur of now, if the intensity of his feelings towards this stranger is anything to go by, the answer is yes.


	12. Sword

"You'll have to share my room. You can take this bed over here. I hope I don't snore or anything."

With the house full of people, the spare bed in Arthur's room is the only one left for Merlin to sleep in. Since Gaius finds climbing stairs difficult, Arthur gave him his own downstairs bedroom and moved into his parents' old room.

Merlin grins. "I'll throw something at you if you do. Something reasonably soft, because I'm nice like that."

Arthur rolls his eyes. "Great."

"Do Nimueh's soldiers do night raids?"

"They've never done that, to my knowledge," Arthur says, "the lazy sods. Not that I'm complaining. Why?"

"Just wondering whether I need to use a cloaking charm or something. Make myself invisible."

"I don't think so. These days, they only come here for their usual collection rounds. Everything's been quiet for years. I think they saw us as potential troublemakers earlier, with Morgana and Aglain, and when I … what is it?"

Merlin has stopped in the middle of the floor and looks like he's seen a ghost. "I don't… have you… is that…?"

Arthur follows his gaze to the sword leaning against the wall by Arthur's bed. He picks it up and hands it over. "I found it the other day. Pulled it out of the field, actually. Only the grip was sticking up."

Merlin's hand trembles as he takes it and holds it up in front of him, point up. "Do you know what it is?"

Arthur sighs. "A sword that both Gaius and Leon have been cryptic about."

Merlin looks at him and smiles. "It's not just any sword."

He breathes on the sword and whispers something, and for a moment the blade glows golden. When the glow fades, the sword is clean and looks brand new. All the dirt from the field and the grime of time has been removed.

"This," says Merlin slowly, "is Excalibur. King Arthur's sword, burnished in dragon fire." He gives it back to Arthur like a gift. " _Your_ sword."

It rests so perfectly in Arthur's hand, like it could truly have been made for him. "Dragon fire?" He swings it through the air in slow motion. When he looks up, Merlin's eyes are bright with tears.

"It's been so long," he whispers. "I'm not sure I really believed you'd return. That I'd see you again. But now you're standing here, holding Excalibur."

Arthur frowns. "I wish you'd stop saying I've returned. It doesn't _feel_ like I've returned. I'm just me, here, now. A farmer, a peasant. I don't remember anything of what you're telling me, what you and Leon tell me." He puts the sword back on the floor by the bed. "But _this_ feels familiar," he adds slowly.

"It's back where it belongs." Merlin swallows and adds quietly: "And so am I."

***

If what Merlin says is true, Arthur and Merlin must have slept side by side a million times, but that was a millennium ago. Arthur isn’t used to sharing a room. Sleep won't come and he lies awake, staring into the dark and thinking about the long and strange day he's had. The quality of Merlin's breathing tells him Merlin isn't asleep either.

"Merlin, are you awake?" he whispers.

"Yes. I'm not sleepy at all."

"I am, but I still can't sleep. Too much to think about. So many questions. Like this one, for instance: how could King Arthur… how could I… how could he not know you had magic?"

Merlin laughs softly in the dark. "I don't know. He was… less than observant sometimes." He pauses and adds: "I wish I'd told him earlier. I wish I could have shown him how beautiful magic can be."

Arthur waits a heartbeat. Two. Three. "You can show _me_. But then I don't really need convincing. I know magic can be beautiful. I know it can be used for good."

There's a small, choked sound from Merlin.

Arthur waits for a reply, but when none comes, he asks: "Why do you think you're back? Why do you think we're _all_ back? What is it we need to do?"

"When Albion's need is greatest…" Merlin inhales deeply, exhales slowly. "I think it's pretty obvious what we need to do."

"Nimueh?"

"Yes."

Arthur turns on his back with his arms under his head. In the deep shadows of the Forest when they'd been to see Scamall, Morgana had said: "I hope someone will have the courage to bring Scamall down."

Maybe that someone is Arthur. Maybe it's Merlin. Maybe it's the two of them together. Or all of them.

"How are we going to bring that about?"

"That's what we need to figure out."

***

"I don't see it," Arthur says. They're sitting on the dusty floor in the barn after sword practice, all of them in a ring: Arthur, Merlin, Lance, Gwen, Leon, Gwaine. "We're a bunch of peasants against a well-trained army of magicians - I don't see how this could possibly end well."

"We have people on our side," Leon says. "More than you think. Townspeople. Wanderers. And not all magicians support Nimueh. Not even all the Nim. They're waiting, Arthur. They're waiting for a strong leader, for a spark, for something or someone to start the revolution."

"Townspeople?" Arthur rubs his forehead. "Townspeople hate farmers. They didn't like us much even before the fence, but now they _really_ don't. I suppose they have a point - the fence made life even worse for them, whereas we gained from it. Theft and poaching has more or less stopped."

He's been spat on in town more than once after the fence was built.

"Most of them hate the Nim more," Freya points out. She's slipped into the barn so quietly Arthur didn't notice her. "How's sword practice coming on?"

"We had a good session. Everyone here is great with a sword," Leon says.

"Except me." Merlin grins. "Only Leon's too nice to say so."

Leon gives him an affectionate smile. "Someone who was bad with swords in the era of knights and round tables is still pretty damn good."

Freya sits down with them. "I have news. I met Alvarr in Strate this morning and he told me Scamall's coming. He didn't know the exact day but he'll find out - it'll be in a month or two.

Leon meets her eyes and nods slowly. "That means we have to get ready."

A shiver runs through Arthur - of fear, of anticipation, of determination. "This'll be our chance to bring Scamall down."

If people like Leon and Freya believe they can can do it, Arthur is prepared to believe it as well.

Freya nods. "This is our chance."

"Time for us to set things in motion, then." Leon looks around their circle. "Are you ready for this? Are you prepared to fight?"

"I am," says Arthur before Leon has even finished the sentence. 

He's been ready for years.

***

With only a linen towel around his hips, Arthur runs up to his room after his shower. They're preparing for an uprising but everything has to appear normal, so they need to get out in the fields.

Merlin is standing by the window with his back to Arthur, pulling on a clean tunic. 

"When I was in the tree," he says, "I was aware but sort of half asleep. Everything was dreamlike. Hazy. Freya came to see me often. Well, not _see_ me, but talk to me. Leon did, too. Even when the tree was invisible. They just sat down in the grass and talked to me."

Arthur rummages in his dresser. "So it's true, then? That the Fire Oak was invisible? People say the High Priestess made it invisible long ago, but after the Disasters she decided to make it visible again."

"Yes," Merlin says. "When she had trapped me in the tree she made it invisible, but when the tower was destroyed, it amused her to make it visible again - as if it made her triumph greater. The only thing that survived the Disasters was her victory. Her victory over the magicless, and her victory over me." 

"Where's that damned shirt gone?" Arthur mutters, pulling out another drawer.

"Freya and Leon could let me see things," Merlin says.

Arthur turns around. "See how?"

Merlin still has his back to Arthur, looking out the window. "Freya and I worked out some advanced magic. We could take a piece of my consciousness and attach it to theirs so I could travel with them. After the Disasters Freya took me to Strate and Glesting, and I went with Leon on some of his wanderings. We went to the old capital."

Arthur's mouth opens. "To London?"

Merlin turns to face him. "What's left of it. We couldn't go into the city itself because it's fenced in, but we could look. It's all overgrown ruins. It's astonishing how quickly everything grows over. How nature takes everything back."

The window is open a fraction and tendrils of cool air curl around Arthur's arms, his hands, his face as he tries to imagine his mind travelling with someone else's. The idea of travelling has always made his heart beat faster, and this is extraordinary. 

London! He doesn't know much about it except what Leon has told him, but his mind fills with images of huge, crumbled buildings, covered with ivy, weeds growing high through cracked floors.

"Wow," he says and turns to the dresser again, finding the shirt in the bottom drawer. "Like a ghost town."

"When we stood outside…" Merlin sounds breathy and distracted. "When we were… I saw..."

Arthur turns back around with the shirt in his hands. "Yes? What did you see?"

Merlin's eyes come up to Arthur's face. "It's not what I… Arthur, what happened to your back?"

Arthur winces, blushes. He'd forgotten about his back, with the five long, diagonal scars that still stand out clearly, pale and puckered now. It looks like he's been clawed by a dragon.

He lifts a shoulder. "Nothing."

Merlin takes a step forward, his eyes darkening. "It's hardly nothing, Arthur. It looks like you've been whipped. When did that happen?"

He turns Arthur around and touches the uppermost scar, following it from top to bottom with his fingertips. Arthur draws a breath, closing his eyes. Scar tissue is supposed to be less sensitive than normal skin, but he feels the touch of Merlin's fingers in his entire body.

"Didn't Leon tell you about that?" His voice is unsteady. "Or Freya? They seem to have told you pretty much everything about me."

Merlin's fingertips are still pressed lightly against Arthur's skin. They're warm and tremble a little. "No."

He doesn't remove his hand and Arthur doesn't move, only looks at the shirt in his hands and remembers his own dark red blood dripping down on his faded, red tunic lying on the cobblestones… He hasn't worn red again after that.

"I've got to go," he murmurs and pulls the shirt over his head.

"Yes, of course. I'm sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry for. I'll tell you about it when I get back."

***

Arthur is twenty-two years old and he isn't a virgin. He has no idea why a light touch of fingertips would set his whole body ablaze. All afternoon as he works in the fields, he feels the ghost of Merlin's fingers on his back and wants them there again, wants them all over him. They hadn't been lovers, Merlin had said, the king and his servant. In this lifetime, Arthur would like them to be.

There's a club in Glesting where Arthur goes sometimes when he's sick and tired of being lonely and just wants to be touched. He lost his virginity there, against the wall in a toilet stall. He wants Merlin like that, too, and still not like that at all. With Merlin, he wants it to be slow and filled with heat and with tenderness, not rushed and gritty on a dirty floor but in the seclusion of his room, in his own bed.

***

"Arthur!" Hunith calls. "Is there any soap left in the bathroom? I forgot to replace it this morning."

"I used the last of it. Why?"

Arthur has just put his clothes back on after his shower. He's still damp and his hair is wet. They had a tough training session this morning, and for the millionth time he silently thanks Aglain for the solar panels that give them hot water when they need it.

"Merlin's in the shower," Hunith says. "Can you take him a new cake of soap? Take one of the mint and lemon balm ones." She smiles at Arthur. "I'll be in the kitchen garden with Elena today. She has a lot to learn."

Arthur laughs. "That's putting it mildly. Good luck!"

When Hunith's left the room, Arthur knocks on the bathroom door. "Merlin? I brought you some soap."

"Come in."

The bathroom is filled with steam. Merlin is standing in the tub under the shower, his body pale in the dim light. Arthur stops, unable to speak, unable to stop staring. Water trickles off Merlin's chin and the tip of his nose, glitters on his shoulders, hangs trembling from his eyelashes. Mutely, Arthur takes two steps forward and hands Merlin the bar of soap. Their fingers touch, sending a jolt through Arthur's body. His lips part. He wants to pull Merlin to him, hold him by the hips and lick water from his skin.

Merlin smiles a little, as if he can guess what's going through Arthur's mind.

Arthur swallows. "Merlin…"

Merlin puts away the soap, turns off the water and steps out of the tub. "Yes," he says, replying to a question Arthur hasn't yet asked.

Arthur's hands close around Merlin's wrists and slide up his wet arms, and he walks him backwards until Merlin's back is against the wall. Merlin's hands come up under Arthur's shirt and his mouth opens for Arthur's tongue. It's like coming home. It's so right, so perfect, like something he's wanted to do all his life. His body is alive against Merlin's as he presses him against the wall, holding Merlin's narrow hips. 

His mouth slides down Merlin's pale, arching neck, earning him a moan.

"Bedroom?" he murmurs.

"Yes," Merlin breathes.

"I'm glad everyone's out."

They hurry up the stairs like guilty teenagers, giggling, and Merlin locks the door behind them with a mumbled spell. Arthur pulls him down on the bed, licking drops of water from the pale skin, skimming his tongue over hard nipples, inching down until Merlin's cock is hot against Arthur's cheek. He glances up at Merlin's face with a silent question.

Merlin's fingers slide into Arthur's hair. "Yes. Oh. If you want to. Yes."

Arthur wants to.

***

Afterwards they lie pressed together in the narrow bed, relaxed and sleepy, with Merlin's arm across Arthur's chest. Through the open window they hear Elena shriek in the garden: "Aaaaah! I _hate_ earthworms!", followed by Hunith laughing. They look at each other and grin.

The softness in Merlin's eyes makes Arthur's breath catch. He can't bear the thought of Merlin looking at anyone else like that, doing what they've just done with anyone else, kissing someone else’s shoulder like he kisses Arthur’s or playing with their hair like he plays with Arthur’s now.

He's been so alone for so long and not allowed himself to feel it. He closes his eyes, allowing himself to be soothed by the sweetness of belonging. Of being _wanted_.

"Shouldn't you be out in the fields?" Merlin murmurs and nibbles at Arthur's earlobe. "Some farmer you are."

"I should, but I don't want to go yet."

"Good, because there's something I'd like to do first."

Merlin is getting hard again against Arthur's hip, and Arthur smiles up at the ceiling. "Yeah? Will I like it?"

"I'd be disappointed if you didn't."

***

 

It's past midnight and the moon floods the room with silver. Beside Arthur, Merlin moves sleepily. In this light his pale skin looks luminous, like he's giving off light, too.

"If Scamall will be here in only a few weeks," Arthur says, "there's something I'd like to do first. I mean, there might not be an _after_."

Merlin props himself up on an elbow and looks down at Arthur's face. "Yes, there will. I've only just found you, Arthur. I'm not going to lose you again."

"You can't know that." 

"No, but I'm going to do everything I can to stop that happening."

Arthur pulls Merlin's head down and kisses him. "I talked to Freya about teleportation once. She said only very few magicians can teleport. Can you?"

"Yes. Why?"

"I've been up on The Burh so many times, standing by the oak tree looking towards the west, and imagining I could see the sea. I don't know if I actually did or not, but I saw a band of light that I imagined was sun on water. I've always wanted to go there."

Merlin lies back down with his head on Arthur's shoulder and a hand on his chest. "So you'd like me to take you."

"Yes. I'd like you to take me to the sea."

"I think that can be arranged," Merlin murmurs, his breath warm against Arthur's neck. "Would tomorrow please you, Sire?"


	13. Epilogue — Sea

The sea is wide, grey, and loud.

Arthur is a little wobbly on his feet after being teleported here, moving at lightning speed through a tunnel that felt somehow organic in nature. Like travelling through an airpipe or a vascular system. Like being born.

By Arthur's side, Merlin looks out over the sea, smiling.

They're standing on a small crescent of golden sand, surrounded by cliffs so high the beach is half in shadow. The sun filters down through a thin veil of cloud, glitters dreamingly on the water and makes the misty air luminous.

How is it possible to have so much water in one place?

"I really did see it from The Burh," says Arthur, stunned. "Although not really the water like I thought. I saw this mist, as the sun shines on it, or through it."

He is irresistibly drawn towards the waves as they roll in lazily, evenly, thinning out into lace patterns and receding in a whoosh and a clatter of pebbles. The sand is damp and firm, giving slightly under his feet, slowing his steps. At the gauzy edge of a wave he stops, crouching down to dip his fingers. The water is icy. When he touches his fingertips to his mouth, they taste of salt. So does the breeze.

Arthur stands up and turns towards land, towards Merlin, towards everything he knows. His world is still small but he has a feeling that's about to change.

Merlin sits in the sand, leaning back on his hands as he watches Arthur.

Arthur walks up to him, stopping once to pick up something familiar. He plops down next to Merlin and grins as he holds out his hand. A snakestone rests on his palm.

"Another one for my collection. Dad always told me to throw them out because they weren't useful, but I liked them. I still do." He looks out over the sea, then turns to Merlin again, nodding sideways towards the grey water and laughing. "I hadn't expected it to be so loud!"

Merlin smiles into his eyes. "And the waves aren't even large today. They're almost sleepy. You should see them come crashing in towards the foot of the cliffs, sending spray high into the air."

"I'd like to see that one day."

"You can. You will. We will bring Scamall down, and then you'll be free to do anything you want."

Arthur draws a breath. That thought is so huge it's almost frightening. So much promise. So many possibilities. How do you choose? How do you pick the right thing to do?

Neither of them mentions the alternative: that things will go horribly wrong and if they don't end up dead, they'll be worse off than before.

"Well?" says Merlin softly, slowly, his eyes intent on Arthur but his tone light as if he can't afford to let Arthur know how important the reply is.

"Well what?"

"What _are_ you going to do once you're free to choose?"

Arthur pulls up his knees and rests his arms on them as he looks thoughtfully across the sand to where the waves are lapping endlessly on the shoreline, each one dying only to be replaced by another, and another. "I don't know. I don't know what I want to do. And in any case…" There's no point dodging the big problem, the huge obstacle in their way. They can't go on pretending it's not there. "In any case there's no guarantee I'll be alive at the end of this…" He makes a vague gesture in the air. "... this _thing_ we're going to do. Our revolution."

There's a pause after that, filled with the noise of waves. Then Merlin puts an arm around Arthur's shoulder and pulls him close. "There are no guarantees of anything in life. Hardly any, anyway. But I promise you I'll do my very best to keep you alive. I, for one, would like to see you as a leader of the country once we're done."

Arthur turns to look at him. Their faces are so close he can't focus. "Why? Why would you want that? I mean… I don't know the first thing about leading a country. Less than nothing. I don't know why you'd think I could do that." He shrugs. "Well, I do know why you'd think that, I suppose, but I don't remember anything from back then."

"Still nothing?"

"Still nothing." Arthur looks away. When they talk about the past he feels like a failure. It makes him sad, and sometimes it makes him angry. Offended. Worried that Merlin doesn't love _him_ at all, but someone who lived a thousand years ago and happened to look a lot like Arthur, and incidentally had the same name. "You remember a part of me that I don't know," he says. "A part that isn't me but belongs to someone else. A part that doesn't exist any more. This is me as I am now, and that's all I am. I'm sorry."

He hears his own voice gaining an edge, sharp and irritable. Hurt. It's not only that Merlin loves someone who doesn't exist, but fear that Arthur will disappoint, that he won't be able to do what he's supposed to do, what is expected of him, in this huge undertaking of theirs.

Most of all he's afraid that Merlin will give up. That he'll never learn to love the Arthur of today enough to stay with him.

Arthur straightens his back. None of that is important right now. The world can't go on as it is, can't be allowed to, not now that they have the chance to create a new one where magicians and magicless people coexist, a new world where everyone is free to make their own choices.

Merlin pulls him close again, kisses his temple. 

"I loved him, too," he says. "King Arthur. You are you and you're different from him, but still the same in every way that matters. Sometimes I think you're an even better man than he was, and I can't think of anyone I'd rather have by my side, come what may."

Arthur turns his head and tries to look at Merlin, but their faces are so close he feels his eyes cross. He leans in the last couple of inches to kiss Merlin's pretty mouth. It's like his world toppled over for a moment, but now it's righted itself.

_Come what may._

"Well then," he says.

"Well then what?"

He pulls back so he can meet Merlin's eyes properly. It's easy to smile now. "Let it begin."

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[ART] Art for The Burh](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12037716) by [Amphigoury](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Amphigoury/pseuds/Amphigoury)




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